Out Into The Storm
by Cabbitshivers
Summary: When a forgotten sect of Frieza's army attack Chik-yuu hellbent on conquering, in a last chance effort to save the planet, three warriors travel back in time to desperately retrieve their salvation. *Chapter Four is up!*
1. Flooding the Rubicon

Title: Out Into The Storm  
  
Author: Cabbit  
  
Author's Notes: This is my first ever fanfic. It's... old, and I had to dig it out from some forgotten box in a barely accessible cupboard that I'd stuffed it away in some time ago while I was moving. I read through it, and despite my spelling (Which is always bad) and some little bits and pieces where I must've been high on something or extremely tired when I wrote them, the fic is actually passable. So, I decided to type it out and slap it up so at least the fanfic section wont look so empty. ((Thanks to Hellie for typing out the first chapter and part of the second. Many thanks for your time, gurl! And for your patience in deciphering what I was trying to say.)) ((And also many thanks to Brys for the mega-holy super-duper double- whammy blessed transparent floppy disk that saved those little secret sentences that never made their way onto paper for me. I love that disk. *Sighs happily*)) so read it, judge it, but don't complain. I just wanted you to see what my first looked like.  
  
Dedication: This fic goes out to all them fans who weren't too scared to just one day sit down and start writing. Don't give it up! You have magic at your fingertips and it's you who can control where it goes and what it creates. Stories are windows to other worlds, and when those windows are shut our habitat seems a much darker and dreary place. So don't give up, and just let the words flow from your fingers and capture us all.  
  
And wont you godamned people out there just write something!!!!  
  
:: Stares at Vegeta :: Okay, down pet. They'll write better if you stop threatening them.  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Dragonball/Z/GT, sadly enough. But writing fanfiction is the best way to make them temporarily mine. (Don't worry. They revert back to the way they were before when I'm finished with them.) I don't make any profit from my works, they are just here for public entertainment, not to be sold. (Goh - Hellcat's Disclaimers are always better than mine!) So please, don't sue me. I'm not even a poor university student. I'm a full-time bum with no money whassoever to mah name, so suing me would be pointless anyhow.  
  
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PROLOGUE  
  
  
  
The day was bright and clear. From the deepening of the sky overhead to the lightening pale blue at the horizon. The birds sang, the creatures frolicked and played, the people laughed and did what ever they usually did on days like this, and it seemed as if all was peaceful.  
  
And it was.  
  
Every living thing, in its haste to forget the evil, had eradicated all memory of the threats that had once brought their existence into question not all that long ago. They wanted to forget that it had ever happened. There was, however, a select few that would never completely erase the days of fighting and death from their minds, no matter how hard they tried. Every second, minute and hour was etched clearly and deeply into their memories, and ever they strived to keep such things from happening again. And so they constantly endeavoured to better themselves, to improve their capabilities, and for some, to protect those in need.  
  
Deep within a cave high up in mountains surrounded on all sides by dense forests, a lone warrior meditated. He was considered young for his race, the equivalent of an adolescent, but in some ways he was older than most others of his kind could ever comprehend. He sat in the lotus position, cross-legged, his arms folded across his chest, hovering in mid-air. A quiet, soft humming filled the cave, though the warrior made no verbal sound, and strange phosphorus lights of many hues swum in and out of existence around him, casting eerie shadows on the cave walls. His green- skinned face was free of the perspiration that would have dotted it performing this task a few years ago, his powers and his intricate managing of them had improved much since then. And they would be greatly needed in the year to come, for they would soon be facing the strongest foe yet. He sat relaxed, wearing only his blue training GI, his fighting clothes. His weighted cloak and turban that he wore while training rested neatly upon a flat-topped stone in one corner of the cave. The humming grew louder so that it seemed the whole mountain was thrumming with it, and the strange lights began to flicker insanely as they coalesced together to form an image. The warrior, named 'another world' in his language, noticed the shifting of lights through his closed eye-lids, and opened them, focusing upon the image that was beginning to form.  
  
Within the lights a young boy appeared. He looked about eight or nine years old, his dark hair a mess of spikes that shot out in all directions from his head, arrogantly defying gravity. His eyebrows were creased and his dark eyes narrowed as he scowled through the image at the warrior.  
  
"What the...?" He started, unfolding his arms and moving a little closer to the image. "This image is of the future - so he can't see me." He pondered this, but was cut short of an answer when a bright light flashed behind the boy and a dark shadow loomed in his place, faceless and nameless. Then abruptly, the image faded, and the cave was once again left inhabited by only the warrior.  
  
Piccolo scowled and unfolded his legs, placing them one at a time upon the stone floor. He walked out to the front of the cave, squinting as the light from the mid-morning sun blinded him. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath of fresh air and searched with his mind for the boy within the vision.  
  
"Gohan." he whispered into the wind.  
  
************  
  
"Gohan!" A woman called out from within the dome that made up the kitchen part of the small house nestled at the base of Mt. Paozu.  
  
"Come inside and have some breakfast!"  
  
Forests surrounded the medium-sized home on all sides and it was amongst these timeless trees that the eight year old Gohan, son of Gokou, who was in turn the son of Bardock, played. At his mother's voice, Gohan stopped what he was doing and stood. "Alright!" he shouted back. Quickly, he bent down and picked up what he had found just moments before his mother called out to him.  
  
It was a small orb - slightly bigger than a baseball and it glowed from within with a soft blue light. Strange symbols glowed a darker blue from deeper within the ball, but Gohan couldn't tell what they meant. Grasping the strange ball in his hand, he ran out from the trees, across the yard, and through the door into the kitchen where he sat down at the table and deposited his little treasure in front of his father who sat across from him.  
  
Son Gokou paused with his food halfway to his mouth, which was no mean feat for the full-blooded Saiya-jin with an appetite as large as his excitement for fighting. "What's this?" He asked, putting down his food and picking up the blue ball.  
  
"I don't know," replied Gohan through a mouthful of his food (Having a father like Gokou does rub-off.) "It looks like a dragonball, except it's the wrong colour and there are no stars inside."  
  
"Hmm, strange." commented Gokou, resuming eating after placing the ball back down in front of him. "It's got a high concentration of energy." he said between mouthfuls.  
  
"I know." answered Gohan. "I noticed it this morning when I got up. I knew it wasn't a person 'cause it didn't feel right. But it makes me wonder why I haven't felt it before now."  
  
"Yeah." agreed his dad. "I think Bulma needs to tale a look at this - maybe she can tell us what it is."  
  
"Mmhm." Gohan agreed, nodding his head. "Right!" He watched merrily as his dad stuffed the rest of his breakfast into his mouth and then burped loudly.  
  
"Oh! Excuse me!" he said politely. Then he turned his attention to his son. "It's a day off from training today, Gohan. What do you want to do?"  
  
His son shrugged. "Don't know." he answered.  
  
"You'll be studying, of course." cut in Chi Chi, his mother, who was sitting next to Gokou at the table. Imperiously, she stood, gathered up the dishes, and carried them over to the sink.  
  
Gokou looked at his son, shrugged, and smiled lop-sidedly.  
  
Gohan was about to say it didn't really matter when a voice intruded upon his thoughts.  
  
/Gohan/ it said.  
  
Gohan, instantly recognizing the voice, smiled. "Yes, Mr. Piccolo, sir?" he asked.  
  
Gokou looked at his son strangely. "Are you all right, son?" he queried.  
  
/Are you all right?/ Piccolo asked.  
  
"Just fine." Gohan replied happily. "Are you okay?"  
  
/Never been better./ Came the reply.  
  
Gokou shrugged. "Well, yes. I guess I'm okay." he replied, confused.  
  
"Not you, dad." Gohan said to him. "Mr. Piccolo."  
  
"Oh!" Son Gokou said, suddenly understanding.  
  
/Say "hi" to your dad for me, kid./ Piccolo said.  
  
"Piccolo says 'Hi!', dad." Gohan relayed.  
  
/Gohan./ Piccolo's voice became more serious. /We have a problem./  
  
"Well, what is it, Mr. Piccolo?" he asked, his dark eyebrows creased.  
  
/I don't know yet, Gohan. But I know that it has something to do with you./  
  
"Me?" he asked.  
  
/That's right, kid./ Came Piccolo's thoughts. /I don't know what it is, yet, but I know that it's gonna take a lot to beat it./  
  
"Oh, another problem! That's just great!" he said sarcastically, banging his small fist on the table.  
  
Gokou and Chi Chi swapped worried glances.  
  
/Gohan,/ Piccolo's voice chided gently. /Be careful. Keep your eyes open. And tell me if anything starts to happen, okay?/  
  
Gohan nodded. "I will." Then he felt the gentle touch of Piccolo's mind withdraw from his own, leaving him alone with his thoughts.  
  
"What was that about?" His father asked curiously.  
  
Gohan shrugged. "Nothing much, dad." he said off-handily, not wishing to upset his mum by telling his father what Piccolo had said within her hearing. "Piccolo was just warning me to stay out of trouble. He feels that something bad might happen soon."  
  
"Hope not." Mumbled Son Gokou.  
  
"Well, if it does," cut in Chi Chi sharply. "You two are not getting involved. You've both scared so many years of life out of me - it's a wonder I'm not grey yet!"  
  
Gohan laughed. "You've got a long way to go before that happens, mum."  
  
"Well, that's very nice, Gohan, but you know how I feel." She said to them, her back to the table. "No more running off to save one world or another, and I mean it! It's too dangerous - you could both get hurt. Again." She shot a filthy, disapproving look at her husband, who in turn looked down at his empty bowl. She then whirled around to face Gohan. "Promise me you won't rush off again!" She implored.  
  
Gohan cowed his head. He heard his father protest.  
  
"C'mon Chi Chi!" Gokou pleaded.  
  
"Promise me NOW!" demanded his wife.  
  
"I promise." Said Gohan quietly.  
  
Gokou stopped his pleading and looked astoundedly at his son. "Gohan?" he asked.  
  
"Come on, dad." he said, looking up at him. "If it was mum going off to beat-up the bad guys and us staying here at home, how would we feel?"  
  
Gokou blinked, then looked down at his feet. "You're right." he said. Then he smiled brightly. "We'll just bring you with us!" he shouted merrily to his wife.  
  
Gohan rested his head in his hands. Sometimes his dad could just be so dumb.  
  
  
  
  
  
CHAPTER ONE  
  
Flooding the Rubicon  
  
  
  
The universe. Unaccountable numbers of stars upon stars, galaxies upon galaxies, nebulae upon nebulae. Spanning unfathomable distances, ever expanding, ever turning, ever growing. Life, Death, Rebirth, - here is where it all begins and ends. Where everything is decided, and where everything eventually ends up. Spinning along its fore-ordained course, reaching out its heavenly arms to encompass all within reach, and even things beyond, the stars appear like shattered glass, scattered through the heavens, glittering like firelight. It is dark. It is cold. And it is silent.  
  
But not empty.  
  
High above the green, blue and white planet, lurking in the darkness behind Chik-yuu where its one sun's light could not reach, a perfect sphere - like those that can only be created in Zero gravity - floated, stationary in its suspense. The ship itself was dark, barely visible, its occupants doing their best to conceal the ship and themselves from any eyes that happened to turn skyward throughout the lazy night hours.  
  
Inside the largest of the ships four rooms, the three occupants also waited in darkness, the lights from the stars in the window the only suggestion that there was more than just darkness out in the cold expanse of space.  
  
"Is this really necessary?" One of them asked again in a thick, nasal voice.  
  
A disembodied sigh echoed around in the dark confines of the ship. "You already know the purpose of this mission, and the importance that we succeed."  
  
"Yeah, but-...."  
  
"Listen." Growled the second voice. "If we don't do this, the kids not gonna transform, and everything we know of, including ourselves, will die. Got that?" The anger and impatience in the voice was barely concealed.  
  
"Oh, man!" whinged the first voice. A moment passed, then another sigh echoed around the dark room. "I guess you're right."  
  
"You know he is." Cut in another, this one female. "This is very important, and we can't mess it up."  
  
There was the sound of someone being strangled, then a spluttering. "Don't look at me like that!"  
  
"Like what?" asked the female innocently.  
  
The first male barked an arrogant laugh. "I might not be able to see you, but don't think I don't know what you're doing!"  
  
Someone mumbled something low in their throat.  
  
"Hey!" exclaimed the first male. "What did you say?!"  
  
"Nothing." growled the second shortly.  
  
"You can't call me that anymore! In case you haven't been noticing, for the past, well, lot's of years I've HAD hair! Though I can't say the same for you."  
  
"Now listen to me you -"  
  
"Hey!" cried the woman. "Can you two cut it out. We have more important things to worry about than hair, okay?"  
  
"She's one to talk." Mumbled the first guy. The other chuckled low in his throat.  
  
"Ssshhhhh!" complained the woman, concentrating. A few seconds of silence passed and then a small LED began to flash on the device attached to her wrist. "He's found it."  
  
The second male growled a sigh. "Now let's hope I can help him through this. It rests just as much on my shoulders as it does his." There was no mistaking the seriousness in his voice.  
  
"Do you think he's ready?" asked the first male.  
  
The second sighed again. "Let's hope so." he said solemnly.  
  
/Let's hope so./  
  
************  
  
  
  
"What?" Gohan asked, startled. "What was that?"  
  
He looked around the space of his room, cluttered with study books and basically nothing else. It was quiet and empty. He concentrated. He could hear his mum and dad out in the kitchen, talking quietly. Gohan caught a snippet of their conversation, then, blushing slightly, quickly listened elsewhere. The birds were singing outside the window, the trees leaves were rustling slightly. Everything was normal.  
  
But he could've sworn he heard something.  
  
He concentrated harder, sensing further away from him.  
  
/Ah, yes! Yamcha, Bulma and Vegeta are over there in Central West City, and I can feel Krillin east at Master Roshi's./  
  
He could sense Piccolo down south somewhere, moving towards the west, and he could feel Tienshinhan and Chao-tzu a little to the north. Kami was...doing something strange at the top of Karin's tower to the east, and, somehow, Gohan could still feel that there was something different. Something out-of-place. Something that he'd missed, something.... Turning his attention back to the three high powers at Capsule Corp, he began searching for the problem. Something was definitely wrong, he could feel it, but he just couldn't put his finger on what it was. Then it occurred to him. Three? Three powers? But Bulma didn't.... but she did! He concentrated harder. Energy burst out around him as he inadvertently powered-up, melting the pen in his fingers and singeing the edges of the study books that were stacked around him. Images began to appear in his mind along with a clearer reading of the power levels.  
  
There - that was Vegeta, the huge figure glowing with a phosphorus golden light, he was much bigger in ki form than in body, and Gohan marvelled at the size of him. /Almost as big as dad./ He thought to himself. Gohan could see shining figures walking throughout Capsule Corp. The walls of the Corporation building were insubstantial, the powers and the people visible through them. Vegeta was doing what seemed to be push-ups in an orb-shaped room. The air within the chamber was red and swum as if water. "That must be the gravity machine." he said to himself.  
  
Ignoring Vegeta, he concentrated on the next figure. This one glowed a bright blue, and Gohan instantly recognized it as Yamcha. He also recognized the attack technique Yamcha was training with. Interested, Gohan watched as Yamcha split himself into three and proceeded to attack himself. Chuckling at how funny the thirty-one year olds ki form looked when blurred into three separate Yamcha's', he turned away and focused all his attention on Bulma. She, too, was glowing, but not from all over like Vegeta and Yamcha. No, hers was radiating from out of her stomach in gentle pink waves.  
  
Gohan creased his eyebrows and tilted his head to the side. /From her stomach?/  
  
Then it suddenly dawned.  
  
"Oh" he said, understanding. "Oh!" he repeated louder, his eyes widening. Then his face creased into a little evil grin and he began to chuckle, then laugh, then suddenly he burst out in a loud gawff that sent him tumbling backwards over his chair and crashing into the floor.  
  
At the sound of the crash, Gokou and Chi Chi rushed into the room.  
  
"Gohan, are you alright, sweetie?" His mother asked, concern etched upon her face. She stopped as soon as she saw Gohan lying on the floor, engulfed in fits of laughter.  
  
"Gohan?" asked a worried Gokou. He crouched down and put a hand on his son's shoulder. Suddenly, images began to flash into his mind, and he saw what Gohan had seen. Standing up straight, he stared out into nothingness while an expression mirroring that of a freshly landed fish smoothed itself over his features. "Huh?" he asked dumbly. Then he made a sound as if he was choking, followed quickly by a gasp. And then he proceeded to laugh so loud and so hysterically that he sounded like someone with laryngitis falling off a cliff.  
  
"Gokou?" Chi Chi asked, backing away from her husband and son.  
  
Gokou just joined Gohan on the floor, legs splayed apart and laughing into his cupped hands. He made a farting sound with his lips and flapped his hand in the direction of where his wife was standing, confusion evident upon her face. Sniggering, he gasped and took a long, deep breath, then sighed merrily, a huge grin pasted on his face. He looked over at Gohan, who sent him a goofy smile, and started laughing again.  
  
"Vegeta?" asked Gohan.  
  
Gokou nodded. "Who else?"  
  
Gohan was just about to open his mouth when his father clamped a hand over it, pulled his son in close, and gave him a noogie. "Don't answer that." he laughed. Gohan giggled and grabbed onto his fathers arm, struggling playfully. Suddenly he stopped wriggling and looked up into his fathers face, smiling, his dark eyes large. "I'm glad you're home, dad." he said.  
  
Gokou smiled down at his son. "I'm glad to be home too, son."  
  
Gohan frowned slightly, quickly glancing over at the orb on his study desk, before he once again looked up at his father. "Dad?" he asked.  
  
"Yes, son?" he queried, perplexed by Gohan's sudden seriousness.  
  
"Can I, uh..." he broke off, looking towards Chi Chi. "talk to you about something?"  
  
Gokou blinked. "Ah, sure, Gohan." He let go off his son and sat back. "What is it?"  
  
Gohan shot another look towards his mother. "It's, ah..." he cleared his throat. "About girls." He said meekly.  
  
Gokou looked quickly at his wife, who finally got the message.  
  
"Oh!" she said a little too loudly. "I've still got some laundry to do!" and she turned and rapidly left.  
  
"Oh, okay." replied Gokou, a little uncomfortable. "What do you want to know?"  
  
Gohan didn't reply. After a few seconds, he got up from his position on the floor and rushed to the door. He peered down the hall, and when satisfied that Chi Chi wasn't going to be returning anytime soon, crossed the room to stand before his father.  
  
"What is it, Gohan?" Gokou asked after a few moments of silence.  
  
The eight year old sat down. "Do you remember when Piccolo contacted me the other day and told me that something bad might happen soon?" Gokou nodded. "Well, he seems to think that it's going to happen to me."  
  
Gokou sat quietly, digesting the information. "Does he know what?" he asked after a moment.  
  
His son shook his head. "Nope. But he warned me to be careful, and that warrants our attention."  
  
Gokou closed his eyes and focused his ki. Reaching out with his mind he searched the planet and the outer reaches of its gravity pull for any unusual powers. At one point he thought he picked up a twinge, but it was only for a moment and it was quickly gone. Gokou slowly pulled back into himself. "Well, I haven't been able to pick up anything." he told his worried son. "But that's not saying much." He sighed. "The only thing we can really do is be alert and wait."  
  
Gohan sighed and nodded.  
  
"You were right not to say anything in front of your mother." Gokou told him, a hand on his son's shoulder. "She would have gone loco."  
  
Gohan laughed. "Yeah. The girl-thing was the only thing that I could think of that would get her to go away. Either that or burping contests!"  
  
Gokou chuckled deep in his throat. "You would've lost." he said confidently.  
  
His son smiled, lifting one corner of his mouth in a Vegeta-like smirk. "Are you sure?" he asked cheekily.  
  
Gokou grabbed him around the waist and turned him upside-down. "You wanna try me, squirt?" he enticed playfully. Gohan grabbed his father behind his knees and, using his dad's firm grip on his waist, pulled quickly upwards, dragging his body up and taking his dad's legs with him. He pushed himself up into a sitting position on his dad and grinned. "How's that?" he asked.  
  
Gokou lay spread-eagled on the floor, Gohan sitting triumphantly on his chest. "Gotcha!" his son chortled. Gokou stared up at him, still trying to figure out what had just happened. Then he laughed. "So you did." he conceded.  
  
Then it happened.  
  
A sudden prick of pain shot through his mind followed quickly by a sound of rushing wind that was barely audible. Abruptly alert, the quick pain all but forgotten, Gokou swiftly sat up, knocking Gohan onto the floor.  
  
"What's up, dad?" he asked, bewildered. "What do you sense?"  
  
Another shock of electricity, a small, quickly forgotten jab of pain, and then Gohan could detect it too. "What is it?" he asked, looking around his room as if trying to locate the direction of the source.  
  
"I - I don't know." replied Gokou, the sound of the rushing wind becoming louder. Suddenly, he snapped his head around to stare out the window above Gohan's desk. He could feel it, but it was difficult to track. It was as if the ki was muffled, almost impossible to locate. /Ahhh, where is it?/ The wind was building, almost howling, and Gokou could feel the ki pulsing with increasing power.  
  
"It - it's getting closer!" cried Gohan.  
  
"No." Gokou corrected, his voice threaded with fear. "It's getting stronger."  
  
"Wha....?!" Gohan suddenly let out a terrifying cry and scrambled back across the floor, retreating from the window until his backward spider- crawl was halted by the impact with the bedroom wall.  
  
"Gohan!" Gokou cried, reaching out to his terrified son who was pressed up against the wall looking for the entire world like Frieza had returned from Hell once again to extract revenge.  
  
"Dad!" Gohan moaned, turning his stricken face towards his father. "It hurts! Oh, it HUUURTS!!" he screamed. He gritted his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut. Gokou crawled rapidly to his son's side. The sound of wind increased, it was now screaming, high, long, and deafening loud. Gokou held on to his son's shoulders and could feel the rough tremors racking his small body.  
  
"Gohan! GOHAN!" he shouted. "Look at me, son! LOOK AT ME!" He grabbed his son's head in his hands and turned it towards him. Gokou heard a harsh sob beneath the screaming of the wind that had suddenly substantiated within the room, and Gohan's eyes snapped open. He was sweating heavily, large beads glistening on his forehead and temples. His eyes were large, the pupils dilated and he was panting, taking in quick, shallow lungfulls of air in rapid succession. "Where does it hurt, Gohan? Gohan! Tell daddy where it hurts!"  
  
"Ev'ry - ev'rywhere." he stuttered, throwing his head back and groaning.  
  
"Gohan!" Gokou called again, but his son didn't answer. Confused and frantic to stop his son's pain, Gokou stood up and crouched protectively over his only child. "What do you want?!" he demanded, screaming into the wind. Papers and things were flying around the room, picked up by the hurricane winds that spun them maniacally in a maelstrom of children's belongings. A flying weighted training boot flew past, barely missing Gokou's head, and had he not crouched low over Gohan's pain-wracked body, he would have been impaled through the skull by his son's sword.  
  
The wind howled and screamed but did not answer.  
  
"Tell me!" he screamed. About to loose his temper, he began to power up. One thousand. Five thousand. Ten thousand. Eighteen thousand. Thirty thousand. Forty thousand. Then abruptly, the howling stopped.  
  
Gokou stood in front of his son, bafflement plain upon his honest face as the papers, clothes, toys, books, swords and what-ever else was flying dementedly about the room, dropped to the floor in a multitude of thumps.  
  
There was, however, one thing that stayed aloft.  
  
The blue orb with the strange symbols deep inside, hovered a meter above Gohan's desk, pulsating brightly with violet light. The ki emanating from the sphere was almost enough to bring Gokou disbelievingly to his knees.  
  
Then their minds exploded.  
  
Pain shot through his brain, white hot and red, and he screamed in pain. His eyes rolled back in his head as he collapsed to the floor beside his son.  
  
Gohan, pain still wracking his body, shuddered once, and then sunk into the darkness, murmuring one word before lapsing into unconsciousness.  
  
"Okassan..."  
  
A breeze carried it away.  
  
************  
  
Chi Chi hummed happily to herself as she pegged another pair of white boxer shorts with pale blue hemming to the line out the back of the Son's family home. She brushed back a strand of her glossy ebony hair that had come free of the clasp holding it back off of her face, and had fallen into her eyes, breathing a sigh of contentment. It was such a beautiful day. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and the skies were clear and blue /And free from that annoying dragon of Gohan's./ Chi Chi thought, picking up the three-quarter filled washing basket to move it further down the line. A gentle wind began to blow, rustling the leaves of the trees in the forest around her, and carrying with it a soft, whispering murmur.  
  
"Okassan...." It moaned into her ear.  
  
Chi Chi screamed. The basket fell to the ground, the clothes spilling onto the grass to lie forgotten as Chi Chi's mind all but fled from her body.  
  
************  
  
To the east of the Son's home, halfway across a particularly large ocean, and slap-bang in the middle of nowhere, was the Turtle House. Inhabited the Turtle Master Kamesennin Mutenroushi himself, (a.k.a - Master Roshi, or, That Dirty Old Bastard.), Kamesennin's turtle (Yes, the one with the power level of 0.001), the pig Oolong (Who turns up whether they want him there or not.), and quite often Krillin (If he has no better place to go).  
  
The sun was just setting, the fiery red orb merely inches above the horizon. The clear sky glowed a multitude of colours, from violet in the east to burnished gold in the west. The ocean swum as if laced with scarlet rose petals, and the salty sea air slowly cooled in preparation for the quiet, warm summer night.  
  
Suddenly, the oceanic silence was broken by the echoing blast of a bolt of ki that shot directly into the sky, turned around 180 degrees almost two hundred meters above the Kame House, and shot down towards the small island at unbelievable speeds.  
  
"Haaaaa!" someone cried just as the bolt struck home and the island was engulfed in a giant flash of light. As the sand cleared and the ocean stopped churning, a lone figure was seen to be standing in the dead zone, knee deep in sand and coated with the golden stuff.  
  
"Phew!" he sighed, adrenaline still coursing through his veins.  
  
Suddenly, the door to the pink Kame House flew open and an old, bald, white- bearded, knobbly-kneed, and very red-faced man stormed out, dark sunglasses reflecting the light from the setting sun and a walking stick thrust high up in the air. The old guy was waving it frantically above his hairless head.  
  
"Krillin!" the old man screamed. "What do you think you are doing, boy? That was too damned close - you nearly scared the pants off of Oolong!"  
  
Krillin smiled sheepishly, shrugged, then lifted an arm and brushed the sand off of his head, exposing light golden hairless skin, marred only by six dice-style spots on his forehead. "Sorry, Master Roshi." he said apologetically. "I guess I...underestimated myself." He put his hand behind his head and shrugged again.  
  
"Damn right you did!" Kamesennin swore, scratching his head while looking at the scorched pink building. "It's gonna need a paint job."  
  
Suddenly, they were struck by an abrupt sense of foreboding.  
  
"G - Gokou?" Krillin asked, eyes wide and unstaring. "Gokou's power just went out! I - I can't feel him anymore! What happened?!" Krillin was almost frantic, reaching out with his ki, trying to find the energy signature that he somehow knew he wouldn't be able to find.  
  
"Oh, no." murmured Kamesennin. "Gokou's isn't the only power that's faded! Gohan's is gone as well!"  
  
"Gohan's?" Krillin repeated, his mind ticking over what they and Bulma had shared on planet Namek. During their time there he grew quite fond of the little power pack. His blind innocence combined with his sweet and gentle nature portrayed him, in Krillin's mind, to be a boy with no evil within him, a child who followed his heart, and someone who made any cause worth fighting for. It just couldn't be. Not Gokou, not Gohan. He just didn't believe it.  
  
"I've got to go." he said plainly, numbly.  
  
Kamesennin nodded, understanding. "Oolong and I will follow in one of Bulma's air cars."  
  
Krillin bowed then braced himself. Gathering his ki, he channelled the energy through his legs and out his feet. The resounding outburst of energy thrust him up off the sand and high into the air, where he made a straight beeline for the Son's house, dreading what awaited him there.  
  
************  
  
The world was falling down around her, she could feel it spinning. Her head felt heavy, her legs like lead, and her heart was threatening to jump right out of her chest. /Gokou? Gohan?/ Her skin tingled, alive to every sensation. She couldn't find them, where were they? She stumbled and fell, then got up and struggled on. She felt as if she were drowning, suffocating. The prospect of her life, alone, swallowing her whole.  
  
She screamed again.  
  
************  
  
The sun had set almost half an hour ago in the Western Capital. It had started to rain just as it dipped below the horizon, and now the sky was alive and dancing with jagged streaks of lightening and ominous booms of thunder.  
  
Yamcha was taking a shower in the dark. He preferred the light from the summer storms to the bright, aching artificial lighting in almost every home. He was just washing the last of the conditioner out of his hair, wishing he hadn't cut it, and humming the tune of a famous symphony, when the lights in the bathroom flickered on, then exploded in a shower of glass and sparks. "What the...?" he started, pushing open the steam clouded screen door and thrusting his wet head out. A sudden boom of thunder exploded overhead, rocking Capsule Corporation and Yamcha lost his balance on the slick base of the shower and fell out onto the floor. He quickly scrambled up, then howled as he cut his foot on a shard of broken glass. Hopping madly about, one arm clutching his foot and the other reaching outwards to steady himself against something, he eventually located the rim of the bathtub and sat down, his injured foot resting on the opposite knee, breathing a sigh of relief. Gathering a small amount of his ki, he created a tiny ball of bright blue light that gave off enough illumination to allow Yamcha to examine the wound, and remove the piece of splintered glass that had lodged behind the skin. Wrapping a fluffy white towel around his waist, he carefully manoeuvred around the broken glass to the bathroom door, reached for the handle, and turned it to find that he was unable to open the door. His body was frozen, attentive. He felt that something was missing, and the feeling was so strong as to feel that it was missing from himself. He concentrated. It was... Gokou!!? Yamcha groaned. It was Gokou. He leaned against the wall. He was missing. Gone where? He couldn't feel him any more. Him or...... his son?! Not Gohan, too! Breaking free of his disbelief, he yanked open the door, sped down the corridor, and slammed into Vegeta who was just leaving the gravity training chamber.  
  
"Get out of my way." The Saiya-jin Prince growled.  
  
Yamcha had no time for this. "You get out of mine." He said recklessly, his fear making him brave. His eyes were hard and narrowed. "My friends are in trouble, and I have no time to listen to your arrogant cockiness, Your Highness." He pushed Vegeta in the chest. "Now move out of my way." And he brushed past the astonished Saiya-jin Prince, breaking into a frantic run.  
  
Vegeta looked after him, surprise plain upon his pointed face, then his dark eyebrows creased, meeting just above the bridge of his nose. He contemplated. /Could that strange feeling I received so strongly a few moments ago have affected Yamcha too?/ he asked himself mentally. He could still feel it too, something was definitely wrong. As the emergency lighting in the Corporation building kicked in, the Saiya-jin Prince decided that it would be wise to follow the human to wherever he was going in such a hurry. The emergency generators humming, Vegeta trailed after the frightened Yamcha.  
  
************  
  
It hurt, oh Kami it hurt. It was so much like a physical pain that she felt like vomiting. She was bleeding inside, she was sure of it. She had felt them ripped from her, and there was no mistaking that feeling, she had given birth to one of them, after all. The aching feeling grew more painful as she stumbled into the house. Almost flying through the kitchen, her foot caught on something and she crashed to the floor. /A chair, maybe./ she thought disconnectedly, picking herself up. She started forward again, then paused. /What was it again? Oh, yes. Gokou and Gohan./. Then it crashed down upon her all over again, and she continued to scream until she collapsed to the floor in a dead faint.  
  
************  
  
Bulma was just getting herself another mug of hot, steaming coffee when a wet and equally steaming Yamcha literally flew into the room, skidded on a patch of wet tile, and slid past her, knocking the cup out of her hands and sending it flying into a wall more than eight meters away, where it shattered splattering dark brown coffee over a three meter2 patch of white wall.  
  
Yamcha "Whoaa"-ed then grabbed onto the table with one hand to stop his uncontrollable slide, the other grasping the towel closed at his waist.  
  
Bulma stared at the deeply tanned, wet, hairless chest, then up at Yamcha's dripping, worried face. "Yamcha, what's wrong?" she asked.  
  
Yamcha just looked at her and shook his head. Running a hand through his short, wet, dark hair he looked frantically around the room until he spied the phone on the wall that was marred by the dark stain of coffee. Running over to it, he lifted the receiver and put it to his ear, punching a multitude of numbers before stopping to impatiently wait.  
  
It was then that Bulma noticed the blood on the floor. "Yamcha, you're bleeding." She said.  
  
"It's not a big problem." he said quietly over his shoulder to her.  
  
Who ever he was waiting for to pick up the phone obviously did not answer because a few seconds later he slammed the receiver down, swearing. Then a moment later he picked it up again, dialling in a whole new set of numbers. "Come on!" he moaned impatiently. "Krillin, pick up!". He was just about to slam the receiver down again when the ringing tone was interrupted by the click signalling that a connection had been established.  
  
Bulma heard only one side of the conversation.  
  
"Master Roshi?" asked Yamcha. "Is Krillin there?"  
  
It seemed to Bulma that it took the Turtle Hermit a hell of a long time to explain where, exactly, the bald priest was.  
  
The silence was suddenly broken by Yamcha's pained question, frightfully loud in the quiet kitchen. "You're sure?" he asked, his voice thick with emotion, his tone disbelieving.  
  
The answer was apparently positive.  
  
"Damn!" he swore, collapsing against the wall, the knuckles on the hand clutching the phone were bloodless, the bone showing through the skin. "N - no, you go ahead. I'll be right there..." He said the last slowly, quietly.  
  
Bulma had heard that tone before, and the numbness of shock that ran through it. Something was seriously wrong. Could something have happened to Krillin? The thought of what that something could be almost tore her heart. She moved forwards, resting her hand on Yamcha's naked shoulder.  
  
He was slumped against the wall, his forehead turned towards its cold surface, but at her gentle touch he jerked upright.  
  
She quickly removed her hand and took a startled step back. "What is it?" she asked. "What's wrong?"  
  
He turned around slowly. "Gokou and Gohan." he said quietly, then laughed shortly in his throat. "Their ki signatures are missing, they were cut abruptly a few minutes ago." He stared past her at the wall.  
  
Bulma raised a slender hand to her lips. "No." she whispered.  
  
Yamcha laid a hand on her shoulder. "We don't know for sure. They could just be trying out new techniques that lower your power level." He said, attempting to reassure, but knowing full well that it was a feeble attempt and that no attack, however well developed or manipulated, could ever erase your ki signature completely. Unless you were...dead. Yamcha didn't want to think about that. His hand dropped to his side. "I've got to get to Gokou's. Krillin and Master Roshi are already on their way."  
  
Bulma nodded. "I'll be along soon." she told him.  
  
Yamcha closed his eyes and nodded, then rushed off to get changed out of his loosely tied towel and into some jeans and a T-shirt.  
  
Bulma collapsed in a chair at the table, allowing her head to fall forward onto its cold, hard surface.  
  
"What is it?" growled a familiar voice.  
  
Bulma looked up at the Saiya-jin Prince standing imperiously in the doorway, still managing to look intimidating despite his small stature, then put her head back down in her hands. /He wouldn't care. Gokou's his enemy. He's the only reason he's still here./  
  
"Well?" he prodded, stepping into the room.  
  
Her head still in her hands; "Something's happened to Gokou and Gohan." she told him lamely, her voice muffled. She lifted her head to watch him.  
  
No reaction.  
  
"And?" he asked.  
  
"And we don't know." Bulma shrugged. Then she groaned. "This is too hard." she mumbled, hiding her face in her hands. Then, suddenly, she was in his arms. She didn't know how it had happened. Maybe she went to him, or he to her, or they to each other. She didn't care. His embrace was warm and strong, and she snuggled into his neck, inhaling the scent of his skin, her hands grasping his shoulders as he breathed warm air onto the top of her head. His arms encircled her back and he pressed her against his chest, the sound of his pulse at the nape of his neck thrumming softly in her ear.  
  
"Are they dead?" he asked.  
  
Bulma drew back and looked up into his emotionless features. She saw a flicker of something in his eyes. He hid what he was feeling extremely well, but Bulma was beginning to figure him out. Bit by bit he was beginning to trust.  
  
"No." she replied. "I mean - oh! I don't know! I don't even pretend to know!"  
  
Yamcha chose this moment to enter the room. He had changed into a pair of shredded and faded blue jeans and a floppy Capsule Corporation T-shirt, which there were no shortages of. His hair was still wet and there were trails of water droplets snaking their way down his skin. He paused a moment to survey the room, then rushed past to the door that lead out into the foyer, yanking it open and letting in a sudden blast of hot, humid and electrically charged air. Lightening flashed and a few moments later was followed by a boom of thunder. Yamcha was about to step out into the storm when he was halted by a hand on his shoulder. He looked back to see Vegeta standing behind him.  
  
"I'll come with you." the Saiya-jin stated.  
  
Yamcha nodded. He'd sort this strange phenomenon out later, when things didn't seem to be collapsing around him.  
  
Another flash of lightening and a louder boom of thunder resounded, and the two warriors suddenly became aware of another figure before them, framed by the doorway and silhouetted by the lightening raging behind him. The figure stepped into the light spilling from the doorway.  
  
Yamcha stared, "Tien?"  
  
The three-eyed Cyclops looked half-dead. Vegeta moved back a little to allow the soaking wet and distraught fighter room to enter the kitchen area of Bulma's living quarters.  
  
"You felt it too?" Yamcha asked.  
  
Tien nodded, wiping streams of water off of his face. "Right before Chao- tzu disappeared."  
  
Yamcha frowned. "What do you mean 'disappeared'?"  
  
Tien shrugged, his face revealing his hopelessness. "One minute he was there, flying beside me, and the next he was gone."  
  
Vegeta folded his arms, and Yamcha could tell that the short-tempered Saiya- jin was beginning to become impatient.  
  
"We're on our way to Gokou's place." he told Tien.  
  
Tien snapped his head up to look at Yamcha, his expression-filled eyes mirroring the shock he felt inside. "I -I thought it was Gokou, but I hoped it wasn't. It was Gohan too, wasn't it?" he asked.  
  
Yamcha hung his head and nodded. "Yeah." he said lamely. "But we wont know for sure until we get there."  
  
"Right!" Tien agreed, nodding.  
  
Bulma watched with despair as three men she had come to care about, two old friends and one lover, left, slamming the door behind them, braving the storm to discover the darkness that had befallen their comrades, and their friends. She sighed, then stood. She needed to change out of her nightclothes quickly, and get to Chi Chi's. At a time like this she'll be needing someone, and the least she could do was be there for her. She left the room, switching off the light instinctively as she closed the door behind her.  
  
Outside, the storm raged.  
  
************  
  
She swam into consciousness slowly, as if waking from a very long, and very deep sleep. The first thing she became aware of were sounds. She heard someone calling her name from far away. The voice sounded familiar to her, she knew she had heard it before, but she couldn't be sure where. Then she remembered. /Oh yes, Gokou's friend. Krillin./ Then anger flared through her. What was Krillin doing there? She had told him not to come over anymore. He was a bad influence on Gohan. /And what is with him coming over unannounced, anyway?/ He said her name again, louder this time. /Enough, already./ she thought to herself. /I'm right over here, idiot./ Deciding that enough was enough and that it was high time that the runt priest shut- up, Chi Chi opened her eyes.  
  
At first, everything was blurry, her vision entirely composed of light and dark splotches. Then gradually everything became clearer. She was on her back in the kitchen, apparently. The ceiling looked as if it needed a good clean and a thick coat of fresh white paint. Or maybe lemon. She'll have to get Gokou onto that, give him something other than training to do. Then as more things came into focus, she noticed Krillin leaning over her, and the concern on his features made her worry. /How did I get here? Wasn't I just doing the laundry?/ she asked herself, suddenly confused. /I was. And then...then...then what?/. She creased her eyebrows. She couldn't remember. She pushed herself up into a sitting position. Krillin, helping her keep her balance, assisted her in struggling to her feet. She swayed a little, but after a few moments could see clearly and the ringing in her ears had stopped.  
  
"What happened, Krillin?" she asked.  
  
"I was hoping you'd tell me, Chi Chi." he replied, walking beside her into the living room.  
  
"Well," she started, thinking carefully. "I was hanging out the washing." Then she stopped. "And that's about it." She concentrated harder. There was something missing - something she had forgotten. What was it?  
  
Then she remembered.  
  
"Oh, Kami." she breathed, her dark eyes wide.  
  
Krillin moved in closer, hoping feverently that she wouldn't faint again.  
  
"I - I heard Gohan call to me. He sounded faint, as if he were - " she choked. "As if he were - Oh no!" she groaned. "Something happened! I know it!" Then she was off at a run, leaving Krillin standing indecisive for a moment before he jumped into action and raced after her.  
  
"Chi Chi, wait!" he called to her, but she ignored him. Turning into an open door, he had to break suddenly so as not to slam into a frigid Chi Chi who had frozen in the doorway.  
  
"Kami!" she breathed, her eyes brimming with tears, fingers pressed to her lips. "No!" she screamed. "Nooo!". Then she fell into the room.  
  
Krillin came up behind, watching helplessly as the distraught woman collapsed to her knees beside the prone figure of her husband, and gathered her limp son onto her lap, clasping his head to her chest. She looked back over her shoulder at Krillin, her eyes pained and pale tears glistening on her cheeks. "Call the hospital, Krillin." she told him quietly.  
  
He moved further into the room. "Are they...?" He couldn't finish.  
  
"Alive." she replied. "Now call the hospital and let them know we're coming. We have no time to wait for an ambulance."  
  
Krillin nodded. Then rushed off.  
  
Chi Chi felt numb. Her skin tingled, her limbs felt heavy, her ears blocked. And the tears wouldn't stop coming. She had to be strong for them, she had to remain in control, but it was so hard when she felt as though they had been torn from her soul. She felt empty, and alone. Gokou stirred on the floor and moaned, but Gohan remained heavy and limp in her arms.  
  
The silence was thick. Chi Chi could hear the gentle murmuring of Krillin on the phone downstairs, so empty was the air. Glancing about the room, she suddenly noticed what a total mess it was, as if a hurricane had appeared inside, wreaked havoc, then disappeared. Then she picked up on another voice, three actually, talking to Krillin, then three pairs of thundering footsteps up the stairs and down the corridor, and then suddenly Yamcha, Tien, and surprisingly Vegeta, burst into the room. Chi Chi looked despairingly up at them, not bothering to wipe the tears from her eyes, and Vegeta silently wished that he had someone to cry for him.  
  
"Help." she said quietly, plaintively. "We have to get them to the hospital."  
  
Vegeta grunted, then reached down and gently lifted Gohan from Chi Chi's arms. Chi Chi was about to snatch him back when she noticed how carefully the Saiya-jin was holding the child, and how he balanced her unconscious son just right so that his lolling head was resting on Vegeta's shoulder. He looked around at the other warriors, as if daring them to comment. When nothing was forth coming, he gestured towards Gokou, and Tien and Yamcha leapt into action; Yamcha helping Tien lift the huge, unconscious fighter into the triclops' arms.  
  
Krillin appeared in the doorway. "The hospitals been notified." he said. "Now let's get out of here."  
  
Tien followed the shaven-haired priest, bearing his hefty burden with ease and gentleness while Yamcha trailed a step behind, comforting Chi Chi who was awash with a new flood of burning, silent tears, allowing her to lean on him. Vegeta brought up the rear, Gohan cradled in his arms, and was almost through the door when he thought he sensed something. Turning around to face the inside of the room, he scanned it and its contents. What he'd felt had been extremely weak, more of an echo of a ki signature than one itself. His eyebrows furrowed and the perpetual frown upon his lips, he glanced over the ran-sacked room once more before turning around once again and following the others out of the house.  
  
They carefully loaded father and son into the Son family's air car, Krillin taking the drivers seat as Chi Chi was too distraught to drive safely, Yamcha remaining at her side, not willing to allow her to descend into despair, and with a flick of Krillin's wrist the jets started with a small explosion and the air car lifted off the ground. Vegeta and Tien flew alongside the vehicle as there was no room inside with Gokou and Gohan's bodies lain out along the back seats. Krillin drove quickly, silently, an unspoken urgency being transmitted through the air within the air car and without, where Tienshinhan was struggling to find the mind of his closest friend, and Vegeta was wracking his for answers to a flood of questions that posed a great deal of problems. Why? How? And most importantly, who? Who could possibly have been strong enough to defeat the strongest of them all, and his half-breed of a son who could possibly be even stronger, without marring them with even a scratch?  
  
The contemplation of this unnerved him, and he concentrated on flying.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
"What the hell just happened?" The woman demanded, turning away from the Earth-filled window to confront the two startled, and very confused men who stood behind her.  
  
"Well... it worked." growled the tallest of them when he managed to find his voice. His face was cast in shadows, the stars providing the scarce light by which to see, but it was clear even when buried in darkness, that he was huge. Extremely tall, broad shouldered and long-legged, he was muscle-bound and well defined with a narrow waist and long, well muscled legs. He was a giant compared to the others in the room.  
  
"Yeah," replied the woman sarcastically. "But you weren't meant to comatose them!"  
  
The tall man growled. "That... wasn't supposed to happen." he grumbled. "Something went wrong."  
  
"Damn right it did!" the woman yelled, her hands on her hips. The light from the stars outside the window behind her accentuated her slim waist and rounded hips.  
  
"Screaming will not help." Spoke up the other man, this one half the size of the first. Though short, he was also well muscled with a slim waist, narrow hips and long legs.  
  
The woman sent him a despairing look that was all but lost in the darkness of the ship. "No - it wont." she bit back. "But it sure as hell beats doing nothing!" Her voice rose characteristically higher until it was almost a screech.  
  
The smaller man blanched and covered his ears with his hands. Shuddering, he hid behind the taller man who had also flinched at the painful rise in pitch of the young woman's voice.  
  
"Peignoir." The large man warned.  
  
The young woman sighed then turned back to the window. "So what are we going to do? If we go down we'll more than likely alter the time-line worse than what father did. But if we don't..."  
  
The big man folded his arms and sighed. "We wait." he said quietly. "If things get too bad we'll have to go down, messed up time-line or not. There's no way I'm going to let the kid or Gokou die and risk the total destruction that would surely face our time-line."  
  
"One question, though, guys." Said the shorter man. "What, exactly, went wrong?"  
  
"Pen?" asked the taller one.  
  
"I'll see what I can do." She replied. "But I don't know if it'll be much. I'll really need to see the ball to know for sure..."  
  
"Just try." he told her, staring out into the porthole filled with the view of a darkened Earth. "The rest is up to the kid. Here's hoping he's up to it." 


	2. Drawing Sides

CHAPTER TWO  
  
Drawing Sides  
  
  
  
The tall, long-legged nurse with curly blonde hair had just come on duty at the East Kong hospital when she heard the roar of air-breaks and the screaming of startled pedestrians as what could only be suspected as being an Emergency case arrived at the front entrance. Unperturbed, the nurse continued her walk up the long corridor into the main body of the hospital, and from there into the secluded staff room for the off-duty doctors, nurses and medical students. One had just been assigned to her, in fact, and she was looking forward to sharing all she knew with the fresh out of university student. Most of the other doctors and nurses were dreading their accomplices, but the children had to learn somehow.  
  
She hummed a merry tune to herself as she waltzed into the staff room, smiling and greeting the staff she knew by name on the way to her locker. Stowing her food, keys and bottled water beside her c.d.'s, discman and other gadgets, and slamming the locker door closed behind her, she spun around only to come face-to-face with a young woman that she had never seen before in her life.  
  
"Ohayo." The young woman greeted warmly.  
  
The nurse stared at her. She was wearing the pale blue coat of a medical student, obviously one of the three new ones, and a nurses cap much alike the one she was wearing. At first glance she appeared pretty, but upon closer inspection her features were revealed to be rather striking. With glossy berry-pink hair twisted into a bun at the nape of her neck, large silver eyes with shots of rose running through the iris's, and clear, creamy skin, she was enough to warrant jealousy from the tall, model-built, blonde-haired nurse.  
  
"Hello." The nurse replied. "What is your name?"  
  
The young woman smiled, small lips parting to reveal even, white teeth.  
  
"Casalin." she answered.  
  
The nurse returned the smile. "Oh, then you must be my student." She said. She had recognized the name printed on the board next to hers tacked on the staff room wall.  
  
"You're Nurse Mari?" Casalin asked  
  
The nurse nodded. Surveying the brimming staff room and its coat and uniform-changing masses, she turned back to face her student. "Well, if you haven't got anything better to do, we might as well start."  
  
Casalin graced the nurse with another smile and followed silently as she lead the way out of the staff room and into the Waiting Room before she was stopped suddenly by almost running into the nurses back. She peered over the older woman's shoulder to see what had caused her to halt so abruptly.  
  
The Waiting Room was occupied by a number of people, but it was one certain group that had commandeered the corner by the potted plant that had caught her teacher's attention. They were an odd-looking sort, composed of the strangest and meanest looking people she had seen together at one time. There was a tall, huge bald man with three eyes that sat half on and half off one of the waiting room chairs. The patch of linoleum beneath his feet was wet and still collecting small droplets of water that fell from his saturated clothes. Beside him sat a smaller man, legs apart and hands dangling down between his knees. He had an exaggerated widow's peak and dark hair that defied gravity, thrusting up from his angular face in black, arrogant spikes. Close to them sat a man taller than the second, but shorter than the first. His hair was cut short and raggedly spiked, his otherwise smooth and handsome face marred by two scars - one slicing down over his right eye, and the other caressing the jawbone along the left side of his face. He had one arm around the shoulders of the woman next to him. She, herself, was exotically beautiful, even in grief. Large dark eyes stared off unseeingly into the distance while slender, thin-wristed hands twisted together on her lap. Pacing the area of the floor before the four others was a very short, and a very bald man the size of a twelve year old. Worry and impatience were etched deeply into his youthful features, and she noticed with a twinge of curiosity six strange circular burn scars on his forehead. Her eyebrows furrowed. She felt an inkling of familiarity while looking at these people, as if she had seen them somewhere before.  
  
"Oh boy." Whispered the nurse in front of her. "Here we go again." She started forward, walking directly up to the morbid group, Casalin following behind, infinitely curious, and stopping before the man with the scars.  
  
"What has Mr. Gokou gotten himself into this time?"  
  
The man with the scars looked up at her and a small smile tickled his lips. But his eyes remained worried and dark. "We don't know. The doctor's trying to figure it out."  
  
Nurse Mari smiled reassuringly. "I'm sure it can't be too bad." she said positively. "With all that man's been through, I'd seriously be surprised if there was anything Mr. Gokou couldn't jump back from."  
  
The scarred man frowned and his face became even more serious than she could have thought possible. "I wouldn't be so sure." he said quietly.  
  
The nurse's face fell as a frown line creased the smooth skin of her forehead. She had better check in with the doctor and see what exactly was going on. She turned to face her student, who was staring at Mr. Yamcha with utter bewilderment cast upon her features and clearly troubled eyes, and had to repeat the girls name twice before the student became aware that she was being spoken to.  
  
"Ah, yes, Nurse Mari?" she asked, snapping out of it.  
  
"I said 'I'd like you to stay here for a moment and get to know these people while I go to find out what's happened.' You'll be dealing with them a great deal, no matter which hospital or medical centre you chose to work in."  
  
Casalin just nodded wordlessly, and as her teacher rushed off to find one of the doctors, questions ran just as rapidly through her mind as the nurses' feet through the corridors. /Just what, exactly, did she mean by that last statement? I'd be dealing with them a great deal?/ she asked herself, once again glancing over the men who had begun to appear even more familiar to her than to begin with. Now she was sure she'd seen them before, and not just once either, but on numerous occasions. On television perhaps? But she couldn't be sure. Maybe, or was it somewhere else? She vaguely recalled a large stadium, filled with cheering crowds and a pair of men below in the centre of the arena. She looked closer at the men in the Waiting Room chairs. Yes, she did know them, especially the two bald ones and the man with the scars, but even the woman appeared familiar to her upon closer inspection. She looked more closely at the other man, the one with the anti-gravity hair, and he fidgeted beneath her inquisitive gaze. She had seen him too, once before, though not in the same place as she'd first seen the others, though they were there too. But it was different. That had been the first time he had seen him, and she remembered being scared senseless at the sight of him and of another who had been with him. But she couldn't recall a face.  
  
As if suddenly sensing her gaze, the mans head flew up and he fixed her own scrutinizing gaze with a hard stare of his own. Casalin swallowed convulsively, but didn't look away. Images flashed into her mind and suddenly she remembered where she had seen him before. Her eyes widened as she shifted her gaze to the other men. Yes, she knew them now. They had fought those aliens when they had arrived. But... but she had seen them die, she had seen the scarred-faced one get blown to smithereens when one of those horrible green animals the aliens had grown went kamikaze on him. And that guy, the one that had stared at her so unflinchingly - he was one of the aliens! She turned her attention to the man with the short, spiky hair and looked intently at his scars. A name was coming to her. What was it? Ya... Yam... Yamcha! Yes! The lead slugger for the West Kong Taitans! But that wasn't the only place she had seen him... he was also at the... the Budokai's! The Tenkaichi Budokai! But which one? Was it the 21st or the 22nd? Or both? She also remembered the woman being there, and the two bald men. And if she recalled right, the taller one won the 21st tournament. Tenshinhan? Was that his name? It sounded about right. And what about the other one? Ku... Kuririn? Not quite, but close enough. She concentrated on the woman who's name still eluded her, but she remembered that she was the daughter of that giant Ox-King guy.  
  
Rejoicing at her recollection capabilities, her little mental celebration was suddenly interrupted by a clamorous commotion at the front desk as what could only be labeled as a huge monster literally thundered down the corridor. His skin was dark green, his face angular, chin pointed, and had long, upswept ears. A large white cloak billowed out behind him as his huge strides carried him past the ranks of doctors, nurses and patients that moved aside and lined the walls to allow him room to pass. Casalin's heart stopped beating when she saw him. Despite the fact that he was larger and much stronger that the last time she had seen him in person, there was no way that she could ever mistake him for anyone other than Ma Junior. But something was different about him. Instead of the expected snarl, evil glare and blast of energy spewing from his hands she expected to see, his face was instead molded into a troubled scowl and his eyes were dark and worried.  
  
Casalin took a startled step backward as the son of the Demon King strode past her into the waiting room and wordlessly took a seat beside Yamcha. The other warriors glanced up as the giant man sat down, but then they returned to their morbid contemplation's, heads downcast.  
  
Casalin sighed. /What a gloomy lot. Must be something really bad./ Just then the nurse returned and motioned for her to follow. Wordlessly, she did so, trailing her teacher down the corridor, past the wards and into the Intensive Care section of the hospital. From there she was lead into a little room which was occupied by two people, one of which was connected to a number of monitors and respirators by a multitude of inter-running cables, tubes and wires. The other was hooked up to a single monitor.  
  
"We keep them together." The nurse offered as an explanation as a tall, grey-haired and bearded doctor checked the monitor readouts. "Usually when they awake, the first thing they want to do is see how each other is doing. It saves a lot of hassle this way."  
  
Casalin silently agreed. She looked at the still bodies stretched out on the beds and felt a slight pang of grief. "Father and son?" She asked, her voice quiet. Beneath all the wires and the mask on one of the faces she could see the resemblance between one and the other.  
  
The nurse nodded, her face impassive. "Look at their charts."  
  
Casalin moved around to the foot of the first bed and glanced over the sheet clamped to a board hanging from the footboard. The diagnosis of the first was no surprise, it was kind of apparent by the saline drip and single heart monitor. The second was another matter, however.  
  
She looked up at the nurse. "That was their family out there?"  
  
Nurse Mari nodded, her face expressionless, her eyes telling her that she already knew. The doctor looked over at her from above the wire- smothered patient and fixed her with a knowing stare. "You wanna tell them?" He asked.  
  
"If that's all right?" Casalin replied, asking the nurse, who just shrugged.  
  
"It doesn't bother me." She said. "I wasn't looking forward to telling the Namek, anyway."  
  
Casalin frowned. "Namek?" She inquired, curious about the unfamiliar word.  
  
The doctor shrugged. "Long story." he replied.  
  
Casalin just passed it over. /Oh, boy./ She thought to herself. /This is gonna be hard. Maybe I should've said 'No' to the doctor's question. How the hell am I going to phrase this?/ She walked slowly through the corridors and out into the waiting room where the group of warriors looked up expectantly at her as she came to a stop before them.  
  
"So what is it?" asked Yamcha, his arm still around the shoulder of the dark-eyed woman who stared up at her, eyes brimming. "What's wrong with them?"  
  
Casalin sighed, then put on a compassionate face. "They are unconscious." She said. "Mr. Gokou was knocked out, though we have found no abrasions indicating that it was a blow to the head that caused him to lose consciousness. He is dehydrated and slightly anaemic. His body is rather weak, but he should be up and active in a few days. Awake in an hour or so."  
  
"And what of the kid?" Growled Ma Junior, the others silent, listening intensely.  
  
Casalin sighed. Now came the hard part. "I'm afraid he's much worse off." She said quietly. In the silence after the small statement she heard several hissing intakes of breath. "He's severely anaemic and dehydrated. His haemoglobin count is in the low thirties, and due to this his body has begun to shut down. I'm afraid he's comatose." She said the last quietly, sorrowfully.  
  
"What?!" Screamed the woman before she collapsed into another storm of weeping, her face pressed to Yamcha's chest. The cry was echoed by the short bald man, who immediately after the out-burst lapsed into deep reflection, while the other two men just sat in silence.  
  
"Damn!" Growled Ma Junior. "I should've known what was coming!"  
  
The short, bald man looked up. "Don't blame yourself, Piccolo." He said. "You couldn't have known what was going to happen."  
  
"But I did!" He burst out, lips drawn back and ivory fangs protruding. "I knew something was going to happen. I warned the kid to watch out, but I didn't do anything! I thought I could be there in time." he said the last quietly and angrily, blaming himself for not doing enough.  
  
Silence descended again. Then Piccolo growled low in his throat, rose to his feet, and stormed out of the waiting room. The other warriors watched him go wordlessly. Then Kuririn spoke up.  
  
"When can we see them?" He asked.  
  
Casalin shrugged. "You'll have to ask the nurse, but it shouldn't be too long, I should think."  
  
Kuririn blinked. "Ah, but I thought..." He started, but Casalin just smiled.  
  
"Nope." She replied. "I'm just a Medical Student. But you can ask the nurse yourself because she's coming now."  
  
True to her word, the nurse sauntered up behind them. She relayed the same information to them as Casalin had a minute before, and their reactions were just as depressive.  
  
"You can see them now." She said. "And don't be afraid to speak. The sounds of familiar voices have been known to help in some coma patients."  
  
The group solemnly nodded. They quietly followed Casalin and the nurse into the room in which Gokou and Gohan were lain out.  
  
Their faces were unmarred, the skin fresh and clean, their expressions peaceful. Krillin realized that it was the first time that he had seen either Gokou or Gohan in a hospital bed without them actually being injured, broken and bleeding. And then he realized that it was the first time he had ever been in the hospital without being totally maxed out himself. The thought depressed him. Something was wrong with his two best friends, something had happened, and there weren't any clues as to what that something was. Or who. Someone could be out there, undetectable even to them, wrecking havoc on the peaceful planet, and there would be nothing they could do about it. The strongest of them had been knocked down all ready, without a mark on him, so he obviously did not have a chance to fight. And Chao-tzu was missing; Tien couldn't even pick up his ki signature, let alone the Emperor Mime's thoughts. Krillin frowned. Yesterday was perfect. Warm, sunny, with clear blue skies and no wind, and he was happy and care free, but today... today was dark and gloomy, and it felt as though the world was crashing down around his head.  
  
"C'mon, Gokou." He whispered under his breath. "C'mon and wake up so that you can help us out." He sighed and looked out the window overlooking East Kong. The sun was just beginning to set, and off in the distance it was beginning to rain. Krillin laughed inwardly, dark and without humour. The Earth felt exactly as he did.  
  
"I feel like shit." He mumbled to himself.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
It had begun to rain.  
  
Heavy droplets of water smashed down upon him. His cloak and gi were soaked, clinging to the backs of his thighs and calves as he shielded his eyes from the water with one streaming hand. The wind was fierce, blowing hard and cold, buffeting him from all sides and disrupting his sense of direction. The sky was unnaturally dark, the clouds thick and it was unbelievably cold. Flying didn't help much, either. His weighted cloak was even heavier, saturated in icy cold water, pressing down into his skin. He began to shiver involuntarily. Why'd he have to be out here? /Oh, I know./ He answered himself. /Because I felt a strange ki signal and just had to come and check it out!/ He sighed dispassionately to himself. He had lost the signal a few minutes ago, but he was sure that it had been coming from around this area. Every now and then he thought he felt a twinge of something, but it was elusive, never in the same place, and growing fainter by the second. Once he thought he saw a flash of something white below him, but it was gone as quickly as it had come. /Still,/ He thought. /I better check it out anyway./ And he descended into the soppy, oozing forest.  
  
The drops of water were bigger down there, plopping down onto his head with amazing force. The forest reeked of mud, decomposing litter and odorous moss, but Piccolo ignored it. As soon as he had landed his senses had begun picking up the elusive ki again. He set off, using his inherited hunting instincts to track the fleeting power, listening intensely to the sounds beneath the splattering of rain upon the leaves and underbrush of the forest floor. It was sheltered amongst the dripping trees, no wind penetrating their wooden phalanx, and his hearing and vision ware uncluttered by howling winds and swaying branches. Thunder roared in the distance, and high up in the canopy above him the trees shuddered. But he didn't lose the signature. He was gaining on it; he could feel it closer, but still growing frighteningly weak. Concentrating entirely on reaching the energy force, he was unaware when the power stopped moving until he almost stumbled over the broken and bleeding body sprawled at the base of a tree.  
  
It was Chao-tzu.  
  
The little Emperor mime was gasping for breath, tremors wracking his small body. His dark green and gold coat had been torn from him, and his once white singlet was shredded and saturated in his blood. It was apparent his chest was crushed, and blood bubbled up from between his lips and out through a gash in his side. Piccolo groaned. Tien was going to go insane when he told him - if he didn't know already.  
  
Piccolo knelt beside the ravaged body and marvelled that the little guy was still alive. But he wouldn't be for long if he didn't do something quick. He gently gathered up the miniature Emperor, aware that by moving him he was only making his injuries worse, but by not moving him he was guaranteed to die. He held him close, careful not to injure him any further, and rapidly flew back towards the hospital.  
  
The storm strengthened.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The tempest was visible from space.  
  
"What's going on down there?" Peignoir asked, observing the swirling maelstrom of flashing clouds from the porthole window. The storm was giving off so much light that her face was illuminated with it's blazing radiance, alike were the objects behind her - including the large, white-cloaked warrior, and the smaller, dark-haired fighter, who was slung over a fluffy, mushy-looking chair, appearing extremely bored as he pumped a large dumbbell with his thumb and forefinger. "Down where?" He asked, disinterested, solely for the sake of filling the silence.  
  
"Down on Chik-yuu, stupid." The tall, long emerald green-haired woman bit back, irritated.  
  
The dark-haired man sat up and sent her an evil glare. "We excuuuuse me!" He said as if terribly insulted. "How would you expect me to know that? You could've been talking about the floor for all knew."  
  
"Yeah, well you're close enough to it." She retorted, turning back towards the window and staring at the flashing Chik-yuu viciously.  
  
The dark-haired man stared at her for a moment, then got up off the chair, carefully walked around the meditating giant, and joined the young woman at the window.  
  
"Whoa!" He exclaimed, looking down at the glowing planet. "That's one big storm!"  
  
"Yeah," Peignoir replied uncertainly. "But it's far too big for this time of year."  
  
The short man looked up at her. "It's summer in that hemisphere, isn't it?" He asked.  
  
"Well, yeah." She replied, "But this isn't like any normal summer storm I've ever seen."  
  
"That's because it isn't a summer storm." Another voice cut in. They turned to see the large warrior standing behind them. He had thrown off his huge weighted cloak and turban that he instinctively threw on every morning, and his azure blue gi flashed purple in the light from the brewing storm.  
  
"What do you mean?" The dark-haired man asked.  
  
"I mean," The giant growled. "That they followed us here."  
  
"What?!" Both the woman and short man screamed in unison.  
  
"There's no other explanation. That storm is clearly unnatural." He pointed out, continuing. "They're elementals, and I'm beginning to find it extremely difficult to pick up anything down there."  
  
A sudden bright flash of liquid light from the planet illuminated his dark green skin and bright pink musculature.  
  
"Piccolo?" The dark-haired man asked. "You're sure?" He swallowed. He hoped the Namek was wrong, but it wouldn't be the first time that this sort of thing had happened. He seemed to have a habit of getting himself into hot water that rose up way over his head.  
  
"Positive." The Namek replied.  
  
"Oh, man." Krillin groaned. "I've gotta stop doing this."  
  
"Doing what?" Peignoir demanded. "Other than being a total pain in the ass?"  
  
Krillin huffed, then spluttered. "Oh, yeah, like you can talk!" He yelled back. "You're so much like your grandmother it's scary!"  
  
Peignoir looked loftily up at the ceiling. "I'm not surprised." She said sophisticatedly. "You're a worse scaredy-cat than Oolong!"  
  
"Hey!" Retorted Krillin. "No one is worse than Oolong!"  
  
Suddenly Peignoir started to chuckle. "You're right!" She giggled delightedly. "Grandmother's always going on about just how annoying he is when she's trying to work."  
  
Krillin smiled. "I'll bet."  
  
"Hey!" Said Piccolo loudly. "Enough of the family chatter, okay? We have more important things to worry about right now."  
  
Silence once again fell inside the Capsule ship Saiya-jin I, and it spoke volumes.  
  
"Oh, boy! Here we go again!" Said Krillin.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The world was blurry. Gokou blinked rapidly but to no avail - he still couldn't see clearly.  
  
"Is it raining?" He asked no one in particular.  
  
He heard murmuring around him before somebody answered.  
  
"Yep." They said none-too-cheerily.  
  
"Krillin?" He asked. "Is that you?" A blurry face appeared above him.  
  
"It sure is, Gokou." His best friend replied, relief in his voice.  
  
Gokou groaned. "I feel like I've just been hit by Vegeta!"  
  
He heard a number of chuckles. "You look like it, too, Gokou." Tien spoke up. Gokou could detect something in his voice, something that instantly made him worry.  
  
"Tien, what's wrong?" He asked, fear kicking in.  
  
There were more muffled whispers, then Krillin's face was replaced by that of his wife's.  
  
"Chi Chi?" He asked, really confused now. "What's going on?"  
  
"Oh, Gokou!" She cried, then burst into tears, flinging herself onto his chest.  
  
"Ah," He started, patting his wife sympathetically on the back. "Can someone please tell me what's going on?" Why was everyone acting so strange? His wife was crying - that was a drastic change from her usual yelling - and something was definitely wrong. He could feel it. Why was everyone so upset? He hadn't died again, had he, and forgotten about it?  
  
Suddenly there was a small commotion in the room as a tiny blue and white blur forced itself through the smudged forms of his assembled friends.  
  
The blur leaned over him, and its face became clear.  
  
"Oh, Mr. Gokou!" The nurse exclaimed. "I see you're awake! Feeling better now?"  
  
Gokou blinked, then smiled. "Hey!" He replied cheerfully, "What're you doing here?"  
  
The nurse stepped back a little and stared at him, one blonde eyebrow cocked, unsure if he was kidding or not.  
  
"Ah, Mr. Gokou," She started hesitantly. "Do you know where you are?"  
  
Gokou looked around. "Well, now that you mention it," He replied. "This place doesn't look like home." Then he recognized the ceiling tile above his bed with all the holes in it that he had counted repeatedly over and over again when he was last stuck in hospital. "Oh-oh!" He mumbled, looking back over at the nurse. "How'd I get here?"  
  
"You flew, Mr. Gokou." The nurse replied sarcastically. "No, really! You don't remember?"  
  
Gokou shook his head. "No." For a moment there he actually believed that he'd flown there. Damn nurses! They kept confusing him. "Do you think you can tell me?"  
  
The nurse backed off and Krillin moved forward. "We don't know what happened." He said. "We were hoping you could tell us. All we know is that yours and Gohan's ki signatures suddenly disappeared a few hours ago, and when we got to your house you were both unconscious." Krillin sighed, hesitating with the last bit of information that he knew he had to relinquish. "I'm so sorry, Gokou, but Gohan's in a coma."  
  
The warriors stared at Gokou, who stared blankly at them and said nothing.  
  
"Gokou?" Asked Krillin. His silence was frightening. Was he in shock? Did he even hear what he'd said?  
  
Finally, Gokou burst out with the question that had been bugging him since Krillin had started speaking.  
  
"Who's Gohan?"  
  
The silence was deathly. The warriors all stared at Gokou in shock.  
  
"What-" Stuttered Chi Chi. "Wha-what did you say?"  
  
But he didn't need to repeat it; they had all heard what he had said.  
  
"Gohan? Who is he? Am I supposed to know him?" Judging by the looks on his friends' faces he was. And know him pretty well, too. Their faces were shockingly white - had drained of blood so fast when he'd asked who this Gohan was that he was afraid they would all drop to the floor in a faint. He shifted his stare to his wife, who was looking at him with such painful disbelief on her face that he felt as though he'd just punched his fist into her chest and torn her heart out.  
  
"Gokou..." Started Krillin, tears gathering beneath his eyes. "Gohan is your son."  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
"Well, that's just great!" Yelled Peignoir, bent over the control panels in the main bridge of the ship. The room was dark save for the green glow emanating from the c.p.  
  
"Are they here?" Krillin asked, sauntering up behind her. He peered around her to see what she was looking at.  
  
The small radar screen monitoring the planet bleeped as the sweeping green line encountered three green spots of light. Three 'pings' rang out in the small bridge.  
  
"I think that about answers your question." She replied, turning away from the screen.  
  
"How many followed us?" Piccolo asked.  
  
"Three." She answered.  
  
Piccolo was floating in the air, suspended five feet up in the corner. He grunted, his eyes still closed, his body in the lotus position. Pale lavender light flickered in and out of existence around him, and his cape swirled in a non-existent wind. "I'm losing them." He mumbled. Then his eyes snapped open and he descended gently to the floor. Krillin handed him a glass of water. "Thanks." He replied.  
  
"No problem." Krillin answered, sipping his own orange juice.  
  
Piccolo sighed through his nose. "We're going to have to go down. There isn't any way that we can avoid it."  
  
Krillin returned the sigh. "I know. But what's got me is how'd they know to follow us?" He paused, the others silent. "I mean... even the others didn't know about this mission until the last minute, so how could they have found out? Were they monitoring us, or something? Have they been watching home?"  
  
"Hmmm," Contemplated Peignoir. "Good question, but I don't think they know where home is yet. A leak, maybe?" She asked Piccolo.  
  
Piccolo scowled at her. "Do you honestly think that any of us would sell each other out? What would that accomplish? They'd kill them anyway. Vegeta, himself, would never have volunteered that sort of information, and I seriously doubt there's anyone he'd want to talk to in Hell."  
  
Peignoir cowed. "Gomen." She replied in one of her rare apologetic moments. "But there was always that chance."  
  
"I seriously doubt that." Piccolo grumbled.  
  
"How long 'till we go?" Krillin asked from across the room.  
  
Piccolo sighed again. "We'll know when the time is right. For now, they're just going to have to hold on."  
  
Peignoir growled and huffed out of the room. The men looked after her.  
  
"She's a little annoyed." Piccolo told Krillin. "She hadn't considered that they might follow."  
  
"Well, neither had we." Krillin replied.  
  
"I know." Mumbled the Namek. "But still, she thinks it's her fault." He sighed. "Though I can't say I blame her. I shouldn't have relied on what Dende told me. I just was hoping that he would be right, but I guess it doesn't happen all the time."  
  
"Wow, Piccolo!" Said Krillin. "Admitting your failures! What an accomplishment!"  
  
Piccolo smiled down at the runt priest. "Courtesy of Gohan." He replied. Then his face darkened.  
  
Krillin noticed and frowned. In this time that they'd travelled back to he would've smiled cheerfully and told the big lug-nut that Gohan would be okay and that everything would be back to normal in no time. But the future had changed things. He could no longer say it. And Piccolo knew exactly why.  
  
Shrugging off his melancholy, he channelled it through into mock- anger. "Besides," said Piccolo, his voice gruff with forced fury. "I'm getting too old to go chasing around after that kid, even in this time!"  
  
Krillin rose to the occasion. He needed an outlet for all this accumulated stress that he'd gathered over the past hour, and verbal fighting with Piccolo was the best way to rid himself of it.  
  
"You're one to talk!" He snorted. "You're only four years older than him!"  
  
Piccolo grunted. "I don't see why I need to explain that particular part of my life to you." He grumbled arrogantly. "It was not pleasant and I don't want to talk about it."  
  
"Ha!" Krillin laughed disbelievingly.  
  
"And what about you?" Piccolo retorted. "You haven't aged since Buu showed up!"  
  
"I already told you." Krillin answered shortly. "I don't understand any of it!"  
  
"Yeah," Said Piccolo sarcastically. "I believe you."  
  
Krillin snapped. He'd been holding all his frustration in too long, and all the stress had brought it up to boiling point. His face turned red, his dark eyes merciless and the muscles on his face, neck and all over his body tightened. "What?" He almost screamed.  
  
Piccolo unfolded his arms and stared down at Krillin with widened eyes. Maybe this was getting out of hand.  
  
"Did you think I used the Dragonballs?" He continued furiously. "Come on! It's not easy watching all your friends grow old and die without you. I wouldn't wish this on anyone!" Krillin breathed rapidly, trying to regain control of his rampant temper.  
  
Piccolo looked seriously at the priest, his large eyes sympathetic. He knew how he felt. He himself had a longer life span than most other races, Saiya-jin's included, and he still had difficulty in going through a single day without thinking about Gohan. He'd never imagined what it would be like without him, when it came time for the kid to pass on to that other place, to be harassed endlessly by Kaiousamma's bad attempts at jokes. It was bad enough when Gokou, his once archenemy, decided that it was time to leave. But Gohan? The thought of living without that child's guiding light was always frightening.  
  
"Then why don't you ask Shenlong to make you age?" He asked.  
  
Krillin sighed. "Don't you think I've tried?" He asked imploringly. "The stupid green worm started acting all strange and said he couldn't help me."  
  
Piccolo hung his head. "That was a strange thing for him to say."  
  
"Yeah." Krillin replied, plonking himself down on the floor. "I thought so, too. Maybe it was just beyond his abilities. But he's granted eternal life before, why can't he take it away?"  
  
They were interrupted by a sudden crash from the direction of Peignoirs' room.  
  
Piccolo flinched. The crash was swiftly followed by another, even louder, and a mass of thumps, bashes, smashes and brightly colored metaphors. Suddenly, with the screaming of tearing metal and the hissing of burning slag, a glowing sword thrust it's way through the wall.  
  
"Peignoir!" Piccolo yelled.  
  
Amongst the muffled curses he managed to pick up a very soft 'Sorry', and then the sword was pulled free from the wall. A few moments later Peignoir appeared, fresh and unruffled.  
  
"Feeling better now?" Krillin asked, still sitting on the floor.  
  
Peignoir shot him a filthy look. "Shut-up, Chrome-Dome." She said, using her grandmother's nickname for him even though it no longer really applied. Krillin was about to reply when she heard something strange. Holding up a hand for silence, she listened intently to the beeps coming from the radar. Abruptly, instead of the three blips they were expecting to hear, their ears were assailed by the farrago of numberless beeps, as if someone had slammed a careless hand down on the keys of a piano.  
  
They got up and rushed over to the control panel where they saw that the screen was alight with a mess of green blobs, almost flooding half the screen.  
  
"Screw the right time!" Shouted Piccolo, the first to find his voice. "We're going down now!"  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
It was dark, it was cold, and up until now he had been alone in the lightless kingdom he was floating within. But he felt the presence of another now, being carried in the weightlessness beside him. He thanked Kami. He thought he would be alone in the smothering darkness forever. He would have called out to whomever it was that was swimming in the blackness beside him, but he was so tired. The dead quiet pulled at his senses, cloaking them in oblivion, covering him in empty surrender. He felt himself drifting away again. If drifting was what he could call it. His awareness was pulled asunder as what was left of him descended into shadowed sleep. 


	3. The Insanity of War

A/N: Thanks for the reviews, guys! Glad to know how you feel about this fic. I'm going to apologize in advance for only having written four chapters before stowing it away in a box, but thankfully now that I've re- awoken it's presence (in my mind and on paper) I can finally finish what I started nearly three years ago. (Yeah! It'd been in the box for THAT long!) Man, is there a lot of editing ahead for me. My notes are atrocious!  
  
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CHAPTER THREE  
  
The Insanity of War  
  
  
  
The earth groaned as its body was torn open.  
  
Trunks grabbed onto the closest thing to him to keep his balance. It was hard but malleable, and he looked over to find himself clutching the arm of his best friend, Goten.  
  
Goten shot him a tooth-filled grin that quickly turned into a grimace as another shudder shook the tortured Chik-yuu and Trunks' fingers uncontrollably clenched around Goten's bicep.  
  
The sky had been dark for so long that Trunks had trouble remembering exactly what the stars looked like. He had been sixteen when they had first come, undetectable to their senses, skulking in and out of their dreams. The skies had begun to darken almost instantly, but no one had noticed - no one except Gohan, that was. And he had been permanently silenced not soon after. Gokou had found his powerless body in his room, no sign of disturbance, and no sign of a struggle, just Gohan. Gokou had almost lost it at that point, Trunks remembered. The screaming had been terrible. He had burst into Super Saiya-jin four, intending to go out and mutilate someone - it had taken all of them to subdue him. Videl and Chi Chi had taken it even harder. At least Gokou had let it out; Videl just chose to ignore it, pretending that nothing had happened. But Chi Chi, she shut herself off from the world entirely. There was nothing Gokou or Goten could do to pull her out of it. They had lost more than just a son and brother that day.  
  
Then the bastards finally showed themselves and the fight began. There weren't many of them, only three in fact. But they were so unbelievably strong. They just seemed to absorb everything they threw at them, making themselves stronger at every one of their strikes. They were indestructible.  
  
Or so they thought.  
  
It was his father that had figured it out. He noticed a pattern to their attacks, something no one would have picked out if Tien hadn't used Taiyoken against the largest of them in an attempt to wrench Goten free from it's unyielding grip. The pattern was long and rotating, but once recognized was simple to follow.  
  
The largest of them usually attacked first. He was roughly the size of Piccolo, earth-bound and hard as rock, and almost untouchable. He headed the pattern, performing the heavy, ground-shattering moves that made it impossible to fight on their feet. Then the other two followed with their own attacks, usually starting with water-based techniques followed quickly by air. One of them had a technique that convulsed the air around them, making fighting in the air impossible as well. Their terrain kept changing, putting them at distinct disadvantages. The key to the pattern, Vegeta noted, was that they were all elemental, and the weakness was that there was no fire. Tien's Taiyoken, with it's blinding flash of white-hot light, supplied the necessary energy to permanently crack the earth giant. With the leader crumbled, the other two aliens were easily defeated, using attacks that consisted of mainly heat.  
  
The battle was won, Chik-yuu was saved, and the heroes once again returned to their relatively non-productive lives.  
  
And it would've been okay if they hadn't come back.  
  
But they had.  
  
Twenty years later the sky had begun to darken. At first it had appeared as if it was a very large storm. It moved slowly, gathering strength gradually, quietly creeping up on them until it was too late. By the time they had realized what had happened, the thick cloud had already encompassed the whole of the planet.  
  
The earth shuddered again violently, and Trunks and Goten were thrown to their knees. They had been performing these routine scouting missions for over a month now, trying desperately to remain undetected, and still no clue to a weakness had been forthcoming. These new elementals were not like the others. They were pretty much stuffed.  
  
Most of Chik-yuu's remaining population had begun to flee underground, seeking safety within their planet's twisting bowels, but with the storm beginning to slowly tear their world apart, it was not all that much safer than above ground.  
  
They couldn't flee the planet; all ships were destroyed before they could even reach the lower layer of clouds. It was only a miracle that enabled the Saiya-jin I to breach their thick covering, a very costly miracle, and even now they couldn't be sure that they had made it through to the outer atmosphere, let alone into space where they could successfully go back in time and fetch the one thing that they needed so desperately.  
  
Three of them had died protecting the ship, their minds utterly destroyed by the pressure from the attacking elementals they had to withstand to keep the shield erected around the craft for the few seconds it was airborne for. The Emperor Chao-tzu had held on the longest, tears staining his cheeks as he strained to keep those within the ship protected. The Saiya-jin I had just disappeared into the clouds when his mind had popped and he had fallen to the ground, joining Bra and her husband Kiterran in their brave and heroic deaths. Dende was the only one of the shielders to survive, though the price he paid was high. Afterwards he was a shuddering wreck, unable to speak, unable to even recognize anyone after he had regained consciousness - he was bordering on being a vegetable. He was slowly recovering, but he would be scarred for life, and would never be able to reach the same level of mental power again.  
  
As he and Goten crouched low to the ground to escape the raging wind and stinging rain, Trunks wished fervently that Piccolo, Krillin and Peignoir had made it. They had just finished burying the bodies, not that they were likely to stay that way for very long with all of Chik-yuu's violent heaving working against them, and he and Goten had remained behind to scout the area just in case anything happened. Nothing ever did, but still...  
  
"Damn this!" swore Goten suddenly.  
  
Trunks looked over at his best friend, noticing abruptly the worry lines etched into his still youthful appearing face. /Shouldn't be surprised./ He told himself. /We're getting old./ He forced a smile and rested a hand on Goten's shoulder. "It'll all work out, don't you worry." He told him, and then abruptly ducked lower behind a rock as something flew just overhead and crashed a little way behind them.  
  
Goten knew he was just saying that, but he said nothing about it.  
  
"Let's go home." He said instead.  
  
Trunks just nodded. Home was the best place to be right now.  
  
If 'home' was what you could call it.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
There was no way to tell the difference between being asleep and being awake. In this dark and empty place where the senses didn't work, nothing was certain. He drifted in and out of memories and dreams, and something told him that that someone else was still beside him, drifting through dreams and memories alongside. He finally summoned up enough will power to call out.  
  
The sound was unlike anything he'd ever heard.  
  
It was full, stereophonic, bouncing around in the vast emptiness like a demented rubber ball - a blazon proclamation like an omnipotent voice shouting down from the heavens, booming solidly in his unused ears. He almost flinched. The sound his question created not only pulsed within the air; if that was air that he was breathing - if he was breathing at all. It also created ripples in the infinite depths of the darkness that he floated within, like a skipping stone skimming the surface of the fathomless ocean. He bobbed gently in the echoing blackness, awaiting an answer.  
  
Finally, a tentative voice called out.  
  
"Is - is that you, Gohan?"  
  
He expelled a heavy breath - he still had qualms about that air.  
  
"Chao-tzu?" He asked, reaching out with his hand into the murky depths.  
  
"Yeah." He laughed.  
  
Gohan's hand brushed against something soft and warm, and he felt his hand grabbed in response. He pulled the owner in towards him, the substance (He refused to call it air) around him warm from his radiating body heat. They clasped onto each other, pressing their bodies close, needing reassurance that they were no longer alone.  
  
"Where are we?" Chao-tzu asked, ripples whispering against Gohan's cheek.  
  
"I don't know." Replied Gohan. "Are - are we dead?"  
  
Chao-tzu laughed. "No. You'd know if you were dead. First, you'd meet this huge hairy deity called King Yamah - He's the Enmadaiou-samma - and he'd check his book and then tell you where you'd have to go judging on what you've done with your life. He just sent me, Tien, Yamcha and Piccolo on to Kaiou-samma's planet, so I never got to know where I'd go."  
  
Chao-tzu heard Gohan giggle and the ripples spread out again, rocking them on its dark ocean. "You'd have gone to Heaven." He said positively.  
  
Gohan heard Chao-tzu hesitate. "I don't know, Gohan. Both Tien and me were trained to be assassins. We had to kill people." He sighed. "Even if we tried for the rest of our lives to eradicate that little section of our past, I don't know if it would ever be enough."  
  
Gohan felt like crying at the sound of hopelessness in his older friend's voice. He started to say something, but was cut short by the swimming ripples.  
  
"Though," continued Chao-tzu. "As long as Tien and I are together, I guess it doesn't really matter."  
  
Gohan remained silent. He began to feel himself drifting off again, falling deeper and deeper into his dreams, or was it reality? He couldn't tell, and he was not really sure if he even cared anymore. He vaguely felt Chao-tzu clutch at his shoulders and heard him call his name. But it faded quickly and he was swallowed whole, leaving Chao-tzu alone in the abysmal dark.  
  
"Gohan?" he asked quietly.  
  
There was no response.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
This was strange.  
  
He didn't remember this happening. Odd. So far, everything he had experienced while he was floating in whatever-it-was, was from his memory. Images, thoughts, feelings, all of them were things that he had experienced before.  
  
But this was new, this was different. He had never seen any of this before. It was white and shockingly bright, figures loomed at the edge of his vision, hauntingly familiar and yet total strangers. He still felt as though he was floating, but now it was overlain with the feeling of confinement, of being encased within something. He felt trapped.  
  
Someone started speaking to him. A woman. Her voice was soft and sweet and Gohan felt himself being drawn into its warm and comforting tones. But underlying that storybook voice were the drifts of sadness and loss. Gohan felt an overwhelming urge to reach out with his hand and touch her, but he refrained from doing so, besides, at this point he doubted if he could even lift his arm. Right now he couldn't even feel it. What luck. He breathed in, but what filled his lungs was not air. Warm liquid gushed down his throat, filling his nose and lungs and he crashed down into the body fully just as it began to spasm agonizingly. He coughed and retched, but the seizures just increased in violence. His vision had cleared as soon as his diaphragm had started contracting, and through pain-reddened eyes he saw the young, dark-haired woman start up suddenly and stare at him while a high-pitched beeping sounded insanely in his ears. The woman stared at him in shock, and he took one more look at her before the pain overcame him and he was pulled violently out of the body and yanked into the agonizing silence and frightening darkness.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
High above Snake Way, suspended in an orbit of no movement around the realms of Heaven and Hell (Called the Home For Infinite Losers by it's inhabitants) loomed the incredibly small planet of the Northern World King, Kaiou-samma. It's three inhabitants; one, Bubbles, a monkey with large pointed ears who's insane happiness could become quite annoying, two; Gregory, a funny-looking cricket-man (So labeled by an even more insanely- happy Gokou) who's ego had no equal, and the great King Kai himself. Though, today, King Kai wasn't feeling all that 'great'. In fact, he was seriously depressed.  
  
Bubbles, in his often unwelcome cheerful gestures, had uprooted all of King Kai's bluebells and freesia's (Not that he minded about the freesia's - just the mention of their names sent him into paroxysms of terror, even though that problem had already been dealt with. Twice. But still, it was the fact that Bubbles mutilated his garden that bothered him.) And then Kaiou-shin, the God of all the World Kings, had sent him a telepathic phone-call giving him the horrible news, and now he had a disturbing suspicion that on the other side of Snake Way somebody was staring at him.  
  
No, King Kai was not only seriously depressed, he was so depressed that if he were actually allowed to kill himself, he would have done so a thousand years ago. Flinging his antennae forward he felt for New Namek. Locating the planet almost identical to the original, he checked it for any signs of disturbance.  
  
"Nope." He said to no one in particular. "Well, at least that's one less thing to worry about." Usually this would be the time that he'd recall to mind that rather happy little time when Piccolo had chased the monkey, but right now King Kai was not in the mood for jokes.  
  
He sighed. He knew he should never have gotten personally involved in the Earthlings lives, but it was like a soap-opera - once you were hooked, that's' it! - You were hooked, and you'd be watching the damned thing until your skin sagged, your legs refused to work and you looked like nothing so much as a bloated toad with grey whiskers.  
  
He sighed again. Every time something unexpected happened, or something expected for that matter, he had done everything in his power he could do to help. But not this time. No, the great Dai Kaiou-shin had forbidden him to do anything.  
  
What a load of-  
  
"Kai!!" The Big God of all the World Kings roared.  
  
Kaiou-samma flinched. Not even his thoughts belonged to himself anymore. The other World Kings were watching him very closely; they weren't going to give him any chance to intervene in the current going's-on on Chik- yuu.  
  
/Going's-on!/ He scoffed. So that's what they called them. A fat lot they knew!  
  
Bubbles ran past screaming, a bunch of decapitated daisies clasped in one paw. King Kai shot one last look in the direction of where Snake Way started, sending a mental yell to whoever was watching him, then manifested a particularly nasty-looking hammer and hit the amazed dancing monkey over the head with it.  
  
King Kai laughed shortly, then turned and headed for his house. He better start preparing for visitors 'cause if things were going to stay on the same course they were headed now, he was going to be hosting a rather large reunion.  
  
"Let's just hope King Yamah knows where to send them." He said to himself, then disappeared inside.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
He arose to the sound of Chao-tzu calling his name.  
  
"Gohan?" The small mime asked, relieved to once again feel Gohan stirring beside him.  
  
"Yeah?" He asked groggily. His body still hurt, even though in this place he knew he didn't really have one, and he felt even weaker than he had before.  
  
"What happened?" Chao-tzu asked him.  
  
Gohan shook his head, not that Chao-tzu could see it anyway. "I - I don't know, exactly." He replied. "I - I went somewhere and I saw things, but none of it makes sense."  
  
He felt Chao-tzu let go of one of his shoulders and clasp his hand. "I'm scared to be alone in this place." He said, ripples of darkness swaying them both.  
  
"Me too." Replied Gohan, closing his fingers around Chao-tzu's smaller ones. "What's it like being psychically connected to Tien?" he asked suddenly.  
  
Chao-tzu paused for a moment before answering. "It's like always having a best friend who sees you for what you truly are, and not just some illusion conjured up by their imagination," he said. "You know the truth, because you can't speak otherwise - the mind knows what is right. I know who my friends are, and they know who I am, so I can never be painted as anything else."  
  
Gohan nodded. He knew what he was saying.  
  
"But-" The Emperor mime choked. "But I can't feel him now. And I feel all alone. Tien has been with me for as long as I can remember, and I feel as though I'm only half without him. My mind is missing his."  
  
Gohan knew exactly what he was talking about. When Piccolo had died he'd felt the exact same way. There had been that part of him that was missing - that soft brush of tenderness across his mind when he was scared or alone that let him know Piccolo was there. Nothing had stopped him from bringing him back from the afterlife.  
  
"Hey," He asked Chao-tzu suddenly. "If we're not dead, then where are we?"  
  
"Purgatory?" Chao-tzu replied uncertainly. "Limbo?"  
  
Gohan shrugged, sending them bobbing again on the dark ocean.  
  
If it were possible, it would have gotten darker.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
Red lights pulsed violently from within the ship as all the white interior lighting flickered on during the emergency procedure.  
  
Piccolo and Krillin stood well away from the control panel where an extremely agitated Peignoir was punching buttons in rapid succession.  
  
"Damn!" She swore. "The computer's not responding to my commands."  
  
Krillin blinked, not sure he understood. "What?" He asked.  
  
Peignoir slammed a hand down on the consul. "I said the damn thing's busted!" She ran a hand through her hair. "That impact just as we cleared the storm must've fried the circuits."  
  
Krillin stepped back. "Then how are we going to land?" He asked, hopelessness haunting his words.  
  
"I don't know." Replied Peignoir, collapsing against the consul in sudden exhaustion. "If only Grandmother were here." She moaned wistfully.  
  
Krillin silently agreed. Bulma would know what to do. She had a knack for turning the impossible into the probable. Peignoir had it too, but Bulma had built the ship in a hurry and Peignoir knew next to nothing about it's jumbled, mutilated and now slagged circuitry. They knew when they left home that it was going to be hard, but this was just ridiculous. So much for a there-and-back mission. Looked like they were going to be 'there' for longer than anticipated. Much longer. Krillin sighed. /This just sucks./ He saw Piccolo out the corner of his eyes, leaning against the wall with his stubborn frown once again stamped upon his lips. Krillin knew who he was thinking about. /Damn this./  
  
"This bites!" He said out loud and kicked the base of the consul with one weighted boot.  
  
Suddenly the lights stopped flashing and the sirens broke off mid- wail.  
  
"What the...?" He started, but was cut short as the screen activated and landing codes flashed across in green writing.  
  
"Huh?" Peignoir asked. "Krillin, what did you do?" She demanded  
  
"I-" He started, "Uh, kicked it." he finished meekly.  
  
Peignoir frowned, then broke into a bright smile. "Krillin! You're a genius!" She shouted, picking him up - one hundred pounds burly flesh, weighted clothes and all - and dancing him around the room.  
  
Then abruptly, they felt the main engines beneath their feet engage, and they were suddenly thrown to the floor as the ship rocketed towards the storm-wracked Chik-yuu. Krillin grit his teeth, sitting on the shuddering floor, and grasped the base of one of the chairs. Peignoir clung to his legs, sliding across the floor as the Saiya-jin I changed direction again and again. She felt like screaming, but her throat had dried and closed up and her mouth refused to work. Piccolo was barely managing to stand. His legs were spaced far apart holding him steady as much as was possible, while his white, claw-like nails dug deeply into the upholstery of the head rest on the chair he was using to maintain his balance.  
  
The ship shuddered violently, barely holding itself together as it screamed through the outer atmosphere and descended into the turbulent nebulosity that was smothering the planet. The white lights flickered then went out completely, plunging the time-ship into darkness punctuated by sharp stabs of lightening that disappeared as quickly as they had come. The ship rocked, accelerating and decelerating in rapid surges. Krillin's grip on the chairs base broke it and he, Peignoir and the freed chair went flying through the air. Peignoir smashed into Piccolo's seat, quickly buckling herself in and succeeding in giving herself whip-lash; Krillin careening into Piccolo himself and having to grab hold around the Namek's neck to keep from becoming air borne again as the chair darted past to crash into the wall behind them.  
  
"Phew!" Groaned Krillin, then began to yell as the ships propulsion received a massive boost and they thundered through the clouds, careening straight down towards the ground, gravity pulling them down faster and faster. Krillin thought he was just about to die when the propulsion engines reversed and the landing engines ignited, jerking the ship violently upward as it's decent was slowed abruptly.  
  
The Saiya-jin I touched down gently on a storm-wracked plain, the suspension relaxing with a great sigh as hissing drops of rain patted against the hot shell of the ship and were instantaneously evaporated. It was minutes before those inside could even move.  
  
Krillin slowly unhooked his arms from around Piccolo's neck and dropped down to the floor as the giant Namek attempted to untangle his fingers from out the foam and material of the headrest. Peignoir slowly unclasped the belts strapping her to the chair and gingerly pushed herself up off the seat and onto her feet. Piccolo, growing frustrated with being gentle, yanked his hands free of the headrest and looked around at the interior of the ship.  
  
Cracks ran the length of the walls and the chair he had just mutilated was the only one still bolted to the floor. One part of the consul was smashed, a chair buried half in and half out of it, and there was no doubt in his mind that the other rooms would look just as bad.  
  
"Will we be able to take off again?" He asked Peignoir, who was surveying the mess with a look of despair.  
  
"I don't know." She replied, her voice low. "I don't think so. Not without help, anyway."  
  
Krillin fumed. "This is just great!" He turned to Piccolo. "Remind me to stop volunteering for these missions!"  
  
Piccolo sighed. "Well, there is very little we can do about it right now, anyway. Right now we've got bigger problems to solve. Then we can worry about getting home."  
  
Krillin nodded. "Right!" He replied, his voice darkening with determination. "Let's get ready."  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The room was silent.  
  
She could no longer hear the buzzing of the artificial lights overhead, and all sounds outside of the room in the corridor beyond were forgotten as she stood in stunned silence. The only sound she could hear was the frantic beating of her heart, thumping in her chest like a demented drum gone wrong. She was afraid to breathe; afraid to blink, afraid to move a fraction of an inch in case she convinced herself that what had just happened really hadn't happened at all.  
  
She stared into the large tank in front of her, through the pink- tinted liquid that held the body of her father in suspended animation, and at the face of the man she had never gotten to know. It was a calm, peaceful face, and amazingly handsome. His features were smoothed into those of a relaxed, sleeping man, eyes closed and lips pressed into a small frown. But she swore he wasn't like that a minute ago. No. A minute ago his eyes had been open.  
  
She expelled a heavy breath and it bounced around the room like the thunder that was raging outside. She often came to this room after training. It relaxed her and gave her time to think. Bra used to laugh at her about that, but she didn't care, not anymore. She had been doing the usual thing, meditating for a while like Piccolo-san had taught her, and then spending a moment to tell her father how her day had been, much as she had done since she was a child and allowed into this room, when the machine that monitored the temperature and consistency of the liquid inside the tank went haywire and started beeping furiously. She had almost fallen off of her chair in fright when the machine that had been silent for years started to scream. She had looked up and had literally leapt three feet into the air when she saw his eyes were open. He had just stared at her, and all she could do was stare back. Then he had gone into seizures and the machine had gone off the deep end, beeping dementedly. Then it was over as quickly as it had started; the spasms had abated, his eyes had closed, and the machine went quiet.  
  
Pan inhaled. That had never happened before. Ever. In all the years that her father had been in suspended animation, nothing even coming close to that had happened. You don't just wake up after years of being clinically dead. Oh, sure, his body had been alive at the point when they had put him in the tank, just as it would be when they took him out, but his mind had gone. His body had been left without a soul, and you just don't wake up if you haven't anything to wake yourself up with. It couldn't have happened. It mustn't have happened. But she knew that as sure as her blood was red, it had. Her frantic thoughts were interrupted by a group of rushing people that suddenly burst in through the door.  
  
Pan almost jumped a mile high.  
  
The door slammed against the wall with the extreme force that was used to open it, as a tall middle-aged man with shoulder-length pale lavender hair skidded up to her.  
  
"What happened?" He asked breathlessly. His hair and clothes were soaking wet and caked with mud.  
  
Pan could barely make her voice work. "It... Ah, he... it - oh, Kami!"  
  
Trunks waited expectantly, his arms crossed and his blue eyes inquisitive. "What?"  
  
She ran a hand through her short, glossy black hair, brown eyes wide. "He - he... he woke up." The words were thick and she had to force them out of her throat.  
  
Suddenly, Trunks was pushed aside as a flush-faced Goten careened up to her. "What?!" He almost screamed. His dark eyes were wide, features almost exactly like his fathers', hair decidedly so now that he'd chosen to let it grow, his face carrying that same goofy look despite the intelligence that lay just below the surface. He was also wet and caked with mud, dripping brown water onto the white tile floor. "What did you say?!" He grabbed his niece by the shoulders and shook her violently.  
  
Pan; upset and confused and not to mention angry at being pushed around, slapped her uncles hands away and stared up furiously into his face. "He woke up!" She yelled, her voice almost cracking. "I don't know how it happened, but he woke up!"  
  
Goten took a startled step back and shot a disbelieving look at the S.A tank. "How?"  
  
Pan ran her fingers through her hair again and turned to face the tank. "I don't know." she said quietly.  
  
"You're sure?" Asked Trunks, his pale blue eyes concerned. "You didn't just imagine it?"  
  
Pan sighed. "Maybe." She replied. "I don't know - I don't think so."  
  
Trunks took a good look at Pan in ages. She was no longer the little girl he always thought she was. Her eyes that had once been a pale blue like his own but had over the course of her childhood clouded and melted into the chocolate brown that carried with them that wisdom beyond their years that was so familiar in her fathers', bore beneath them large, dark circles, that no doubt he was carrying beneath his own. Her face was pale, strained, and looking older than her twenty-five years should allow. Then he sighed. They were all older than they should be; they were all empty and worn before their time.  
  
"When did this happen?" Someone demanded from behind him. Then a distinguished-looking woman with pale green hair pushed past him to stand arrogantly before the small group, her hands on her hips and a small green, white-bellied cat hovering just above her shoulder.  
  
"Okassan," Started Trunks.  
  
Bulma held up her hand, preventing him from saying anything further. She moved past her silenced son and his best friend and halted before Pan. "When did this happen?" She asked again, quieter this time.  
  
"A few minutes ago." replied Pan.  
  
Bulma walked over to the monitor, Puar at her shoulder, and looked intently at the readouts on the machines screen. She shot a direct look into Pan's eyes. "Tell me what happened."  
  
Pan described it as best she could, with no elaboration and in as much detail as she could recall. As she was talking she grew aware of others joining those that were already in the room. Trunks' wife Jade - a kung-foo maniac that he'd met at one of the Budokai's, Goten's girlfriend Pei-ju, who had almost finished the third trimester of her pregnancy and was on full-term's doorstep, and Oolong. Everybody save the unconscious Dende who were living in the underground levels of Capsule Corporation. Home.  
  
As she finished talking, she became more aware of the silence that filled the room. She could tell that they wanted to believe her; there was a wishful hoping in all of their eyes, but even she admitted that if she hadn't seen it with her own eyes she'd have a very hard time believing it.  
  
Bulma spoke first. "Then he woke up." she said. She walked over to the S.A tank, looking through the pink liquid into the face of the man the tank contained. She gently ran her fingertips over the Perspex of the window before turning back to look at what remained of Chik-yuu's greatest warriors. "We're taking shifts." She stated. "This room is not to be unoccupied for one minute."  
  
"But Bulma," Started Jade, her husky voice unnaturally loud in the quiet room. "There are not enough of us to carry out a unit like that and keep up our scouting missions."  
  
"The robot's will take the shifts in-between." She replied. "So you can still continue your scouts and keep and eye on Gohan without getting too worn out. Besides," she added, casting a sidelong glance at a short pig wearing a white singlet and a pair of brown shorts. "Oolong has nothing better to do than clean and annoy me - so he can take any of your shifts if you're too tired."  
  
The others all murmured their agreements apart from Oolong, who began to protest but was abruptly silenced by a quick foot in the mouth cheerfully offered by the bright yellow-haired woman at Goten's side.  
  
"Thanks, Pei-ju." Said Bulma.  
  
"You're welcome." She replied smugly.  
  
Bulma smiled generously at her before turning away and heading out of the room. "First shift starts now." She called quietly over her shoulder to them. "Same pattern as the scouting with gaps in between each for the robots. We have work to do." And with that she left.  
  
"I hope Peignoir gets back soon." Trunks murmured.  
  
Jade heard and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, resting her head upon his chest. "Me too. " She answered quietly. Trunks hugged her in turn, his cheek resting on top of her dark green hair. He sighed. At least the future was starting to look a little brighter.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
It was past midnight when Casalin went in to check on the Son's.  
  
The room was filled with gentle snoring, soft whispers of breath that accompany the state of sleep. But something was wrong. Casalin heard more snores than just the two that should be in there.  
  
Looking around, she noticed the people that she'd somehow managed to kick out three hours earlier, stationed around the room, sleeping peacefully. Son Gokou's wife was still sitting on the chair at her son's side, though now her head was bent onto the mattress as she slept with one of his small hands clasped in hers. Kuririn, the smallest of them all save the son, was curled up at the bottom of Son Gohan's bed - there being enough room as Gohan barely took up even half the length of the standard hospital cot. The tall, green Demon King floated in the corner, his eyes closed. It looked as if he was sleeping, but Casalin had the idea that he was really just deep in a state of meditation. On the small couch pushed against the wall, the strange man with the sticking-up hair that defied gravity was asleep sitting up, his arms crossed and a gentler frown on his lips than the one he wore when he was awake. On his lap rested the sleeping head of a stunning woman with pale aquamarine hair that spilled over his knees like languid water.  
  
In the darkness someone mumbled, and she looked up over her shoulder to see the scarred-faced Yamcha sleeping on top of the single double-doored cupboard against one wall. The sight was so unexpected that she started badly, taking a surprised step back, her tail flicking out agitatedly from beneath her full skirt in an uncontrollable spasm that sent it slamming into Son Gokou's bed-post with a loud 'thunk'.  
  
Abruptly, the man on the couch jerked awake.  
  
Casalin turned to him in horror as he opened his eyes slowly and fixed them steadily upon her. She stood there, her pale rose-colored eyes wide as her lips parted in shock and fear.  
  
The mans dark eyes searched her face for a moment, then dropped lower to her waist where she was grasping the brown fuzzy tail and unconsciously rubbing it where it had connected with Son Gokou's bed. They lingered there a moment, then flicked over to the huge dent in the metal of the bed-post where her tail had impacted, before once again returning their obsidian gaze to her face.  
  
With cold purpose, he stood, ignoring the woman as her head flopped down onto the couch, and moved with silent, stalking steps towards her.  
  
Casalin suddenly had an impulsive urge to run, to escape, to cross the eight meters to the window and leap out into the cold night air.  
  
But she didn't.  
  
She couldn't.  
  
Her legs seemed to be frozen to the floor.  
  
She stood there, immobile, her breathing rapidly accelerating as the small man came menacingly towards her, his movements as lithe as a hunting cat's. Suddenly, he lunged forward, quicker than she had anticipated, quicker than she even thought possible, and snatched her tail out of her hands. Pain shot through her, slicing up from her tail through her spine to shatter in her head. And instinctively, without thinking, she backhanded him across the cheek.  
  
His head snapped around with the force of the blow, his eyes widening in surprise as he reflexively let her tail go. He turned to stare at her, his face mirroring the confusion plastered on her own features, as he raised a gloved fist to the side of his face. As he drew it back, a small spot of blood glowed on the white material of the glove. The man looked disbelievingly at it, then shot her another unreadable glare.  
  
Casalin swallowed. Power was almost radiating from this man, and even if hitting him was the wrong thing to do - which it obviously was - there was no way she could take it back now. /Baka! If only I hadn't been so easily startled!/ She exclaimed to herself. /If only I'd gotten the damn thing removed when I could!/ Her tail flicked agitatedly behind her, swishing the material of her nurses uniform.  
  
The man suddenly lunged forward again, but instead of grabbing her tail, he thrust his hand up under her chin, curling his fingers around her throat and forcing her up against the wall, her shoulders slamming painfully back.  
  
She grasped at the hand at her throat, trying to pry the fingers away, but his grip was stronger than she expected.  
  
"Who are you?" The man demanded, his rough voice loud in the sleeping room.  
  
Casalin choked, her throat refusing to work with the pressure pushing against it. She kicked out viciously with one of her legs, catching the man right below the knee.  
  
The man roared and threw her to the floor. Sitting atop her, he encircled her neck with both of his hands and pressed down harder.  
  
"Who are you?" He repeated. "Why do you have a tail?" His fingers loosened their grip a little, allowing her to reply.  
  
"A - a tail?" She croaked, confused, his vice-like fingers still making it difficult to form words. "Why do you care if I have a tail?"  
  
"Answer me!" He roared, his fingers tightening.  
  
Casalin had had enough. A scream of outrage and humiliation building in her blocked throat, she let go of the mans wrists and shoved her hands against his stomach, a bolt of ki shooting from her palms.  
  
The man went flying back across the room, slamming into the cupboard doors, making them collapse inwards, their hinges broken, as he immediately dropped to the floor in a crouch. The front of his shirt was blown away, but the olive skin beneath was unmarred.  
  
Casalin frowned, picking herself up off the floor. A small blast like that would have badly hurt a normal person. /But then again,/ She amended to herself. /He's not exactly a 'normal' person./ But still, it had been at extremely close range. Hell, any closer and she'd have been inside of him. Staring across the room at the crouching man she assumed a defensive position. There was no way that she was going to let this man push her into a vulnerable position again. Absolutely no way.  
  
Then suddenly, the room came to life.  
  
Yamcha, awoken by the shuddering of the cupboard beneath him and the screaming that had accompanied it, rolled off of the top in his sleepy stupor, and fell, yelling, onto the floor in a graceless lump. The women, in turn, awoken by Yamcha's yell, started up from their sleep - Son Gokou's wife reacting so violently that she flew up off of the chair and landed on her husband in the bed behind her, waking him up with a snort. The beautiful woman with aquamarine hair rushed up off of the small couch and ran over to the light switch on the opposite wall, flicking it on, and finally awakening Kuririn.  
  
The room suddenly stilled.  
  
Eyes of various shades and colours widened in either shock, confusion or awe as they fixed themselves first upon the somewhat ruffled Vegeta, and then upon the crouching nurse, who's dress was jerking wildly behind her as the tip of a brown fuzzy tail flicked out from beneath the hem.  
  
Casalin stared back, her mind running over her options, which were low in number and few to her liking. She could run, but that would solve nothing and that man would more than likely catch her. She could fight, but there were more of them and they all had far more experience than she. Or, she could surrender and wait to see what would happen. But surrender was paramount to the death of a warrior, her father had told her, and was something one never did. Ever.  
  
Her indecision was interrupted by a startled cry.  
  
"A tail!" Yelled Son Gokou, his wife on his lap. "She has a tail!"  
  
"What?" Yelled back a very displeased Yamcha, picking himself up off the floor.  
  
"But..." Started the aquamarine-haired woman.  
  
The room burst into song.  
  
"It's impossible!" Stated Yamcha.  
  
"Another?" Asked Kuririn.  
  
"Gokou?" Inquired his wife, concerned.  
  
"Could she be a Saiya-jin?" Asked the Demon King aloud.  
  
"I don't know..." Replied Yamcha, unsure.  
  
"Her hair's the wrong colour." Observed Kuririn.  
  
"So what has that got to do with anything?" Demanded the aquamarine- haired woman.  
  
"What do you mean?" Asked Gokou's wife.  
  
"A Saiya-jin." Echoed Gokou.  
  
"But I thought..." Trailed off Yamcha.  
  
"We were the last." Gokou finished.  
  
"What the hell's going on?!" Screamed the aquamarine-haired woman.  
  
"WILL YOU ALL JUST SHUT UP!" Yelled the short man with the sticking- up hair.  
  
The room was abruptly quieted.  
  
Casalin was in shock. The Demon King didn't say what she just thought he did, did he? He had, surely he had, and Son Gokou had backed him up. They had said it twice, she was sure that they had said it. Her ears had never failed her before. A Saiya-jin. A Saiya-jin. How did they know?  
  
The short man was moving towards her again, less threatening now, but still intimidating. She held her ground.  
  
"Who are you?" He asked again, his voice cold, demanding, and even though he had halted his advance a meter away she felt as though he were right in her face.  
  
"You - you already know my name." She replied, ice-rose eyes wide.  
  
"Say it!" The man demanded.  
  
"Vegeta." The woman with the aquamarine hair warned. The man ignored her.  
  
"Casalin." She replied, wondering what this was leading to.  
  
The man named Vegeta stared at her with an unreadable expression, one eyebrow cocked. "Last name?" He asked. He didn't understand what was with these last names, but he figured that with all these Human's around it was a pretty simple method of keeping tabs on who was whose brat.  
  
Casalin creased her eyebrows. /What is with this?/ She asked herself. "I don't have one." She replied. "Doe is the closest I'm going to get."  
  
Vegeta managed to look mildly surprised at this statement.  
  
"Who were your parents?" He asked.  
  
"Vegeta - is this really necessary?" Asked the aquamarine-haired woman.  
  
Casalin looked at all the faces around the room. "Why is this at all necessary?"  
  
Vegeta took a menacing step forwards. "Who were your parents?" He demanded.  
  
Casalin's face creased in fury. "They're none of your business!" She yelled into his face, her eyes dancing like orchid flames.  
  
Vegeta's face hardened, becoming stony and as solid as granite. "If you're what I think you are then you're damned well my business!" He yelled.  
  
"Oh," She replied smartly. "And just what do you think I am?"  
  
His glare darkened. "You tell me." he growled.  
  
"Why should I?" She asked. "I don't see why it's necessary."  
  
Vegeta's scowl deepened. "You'll tell me or I'll-"  
  
"Or you'll what?" Casalin interrupted calmly. "Kill me? Then you'll never find out what you want to know."  
  
Gokou, from the hospital bed, looked from one tense angry face to the other, then, pushing his wife off of his lap and hopping gingerly out of the bed, made his way staggeringly over to them. He laid a light hand on Casalin's shoulder and smiled at her.  
  
"Please?" He asked. "Won't you tell us what we need to know?"  
  
Casalin frowned up at him, and then cast a glance over at the still- fuming Vegeta. "What I don't understand is why you need to know. But if you just ask me, instead of trying to beat it out of me, I might answer any questions you have."  
  
Vegeta's scowl deepened even more, while Gokou's smile broadened.  
  
"First of all," He said. "We'd like to know where you got your tail from."  
  
"I was born with it." Numerous glances were shared about the room and Casalin grew more uncomfortable. Why were they so interested in her past? Why did they want to know about her tail? Her last name? Her Parents?  
  
"Then," Spoke up the Demon King, now standing before her. "We'd like to know how you did that." He said, indicating the front of Vegeta's shirt.  
  
"Oh," Casalin smiled maliciously. "Like this." And as quick as lightning her arms shot forward and two bolts of ki shot from out her palms and struck Vegeta solidly in the chest. He fell back into Yamcha, who helped him up before being shoved back into the wall himself for his troubles.  
  
"Gee, that's gratitude for ya." He mumbled to himself.  
  
The Demon King smirked as the ruffled Vegeta tore off what was left of his shirt indignantly and muttered something illegible under his breath.  
  
"Here's another one." Spoke up Kuririn from the end of Son Gohan's bed. "When the Moon was full, did you ever look at it?"  
  
Casalin gasped, her eyes widening as she took a startled step back. They knew about that? But, how? How did they know? "I don't think I should answer that one." She said shakily.  
  
"Answer it, woman!" Ordered Vegeta from beside her.  
  
"N-no." She said breathlessly, her heart thumping loudly in her chest. "I was never allowed outside after dark on those nights where the Moon was full."  
  
"Why not?" Asked Yamcha from behind Vegeta.  
  
Casalin shot him a frightened look before turning her eyes back to Son Gokou.  
  
"Because if I did something unwanted would happen."  
  
"What? What would happen?" He prodded.  
  
She looked at them, her eyes like rose-tinted glass, their depths searching the faces before her for any sign of their intentions. "You know," She said to them slowly, "That I would turn Oozaru."  
  
Several breaths were expelled sharply as every person in the room suddenly seemed to relax. Vegeta moved out from beyond her peripheral vision to stand before her. His eyes met hers expressionlessly, and she almost took a startled step back when she felt his fingers under her chin, but they were gentle this time, not strangulating her, and she held her place as he tilted her face up slightly to meet his narrowed gaze. "Where are you parents?" He asked.  
  
Casalin looked at him and shook her head imperceptibly against his fingers. "My parents are dead." She replied quietly. "They were murdered."  
  
"By who?" Vegeta demanded, releasing her chin and stepping back away from her. "Who was strong enough to destroy two Naichi-jin?"  
  
Casalin's head flew up and she fixed the dark-haired man with a disbelieving stare. "How did you-?"  
  
Vegeta smirked. "Did you think I wouldn't notice? Just how many Saiya- jin's with pink hair are there?"  
  
One corner of Casalin's lips twitched, but her eyes remained sorrowful. "Far too little." She murmured. Then a question began to burn within her. "How do you know so much about Saiya-jin's?" She asked them.  
  
There was a rustle among them, and then Son Gokou spoke. "Because some of us are Saiya-jin's."  
  
Casalin spun around to face him. "Impossible!" She cried, her whole body shouting out with her disbelief. "Frieza killed us all!"  
  
"Well, he missed a few." Replied Gokou.  
  
Casalin blinked and brushed a strand of her hair off of her face. "How many?" she asked on an expelled breath.  
  
"Well," Replied Gokou, once again sitting down on his bed. "Originally, we thought there was four. Me, my brother Radditz, Nappa, and Vegeta over there." He inclined his head towards the stoic figure, which scowled at him. "But you've given us another name to add to that list."  
  
Casalin frowned. "You? Then your son must be - "  
  
"Half-Saiya-jin." He finished. "Yes." He looked over his shoulder at the boy smothered by wires and blankets. "In some ways he's stronger than any of us will ever be, but in others..." He cut off and looked away, and his wife wrapped her arms around him.  
  
"At least you remember him now." She murmured in his ear.  
  
"Nani?" He replied, confused. "Why wouldn't I?"  
  
"Never mind." She smiled.  
  
Casalin turned to Vegeta. "You?" She asked.  
  
Vegeta snorted. "Kakarotto's pronunciation of the Saiya-jin language is somewhat lacking." He commented. "My name, beyond the baka's illegible comprehension of it, is Bejita."  
  
Casalin's eyes immediately widened. Her lips trembled. "Bejita no Kokuoo?" She asked, her breath coming on a startled gasp.  
  
Vegeta's eyes narrowed and he shook his head. "My father is dead."  
  
Casalin's face drained of all colour. "B-Bejita no Ouji?"  
  
At this Vegeta nodded. "Hai."  
  
There was a moment of silence between the two, and Kuririn took this opportunity to ask his question.  
  
"Uh," He spoke up hesitantly. "I hope you don't mind me asking, but what, exactly, are the Naichi-jin?"  
  
Casalin looked at Vegeta and motioned for him to speak. Vegeta cocked an eyebrow at her, but then shrugged.  
  
"A Naichi-jin," He started, turning to face Kuririn. "Is a branch-off from the Saiya-jin race. A sort of..." Vegeta paused, trying to come up with a suitable description. "Mutant."  
  
Casalin's brows had furrowed and she was about to protest when Vegeta held up a hand for silence. All within the room were attentive and listening.  
  
"They are like your albino's." Continued Vegeta. "Only a Saiya-jin equivalent. Usually Saiya-jin's have either dark brown, deep red, or black hair. These defects have bright iridescent colours, their eyes usually matching the colour of their hair. They are abnormally stronger than the average Saiya-jin baby at birth. The equivalent of Nappa, only not as stupid."  
  
There were a number of startled gasps around the room as those who had seen the full brunt of Nappa's powers tried to comprehend the enormity of it all. A baby, a newborn, with the same level of power as Nappa? Yamcha shuddered. /I'd hate to be that kids baby-sitter./ He thought to himself. Even though Nappa was long gone - destroyed by a somewhat changed Vegeta - he'd been stronger than what they'd been at the time. Of course, he wouldn't stand a chance now, but still - what power for a baby to have! He got a headache just thinking about it.  
  
"Unfortunately," Carried on Vegeta. "Their bodies are unusually weak, and in battles if it comes to hand-to-hand contact very few of them have a chance. They either die from sustained injuries that would normally leave a full-blooded Saiya-jin with a pale bruise," Vegeta paused. "Or from self- implosion. Sometimes the power is too much for them."  
  
Everyone was silent as waves of pity washed over them all. Such incredible strengths, and yet such horrible weaknesses. Vegeta saw the looks on their faces and was suddenly infused with anger.  
  
"Do not pity them!" He near-shouted. "They are greater warriors than you will ever be, and deserve your respect - not some weaklings pity!"  
  
Krillin shuddered. He knew why Vegeta was angry, and he knew what it was like to implode, too. About twenty times worse than explosion. Irritated, he rubbed at a pain in the back of his head.  
  
"So what you're saying," Said the Demon King from across the room. "Is that the Naichi-jin are a separate race of Saiya-jin's?"  
  
Vegeta nodded.  
  
"So why'da they have a different name?" Asked Yamcha. "It sounds almost racist."  
  
Vegeta scowled at him. "Why do you have different names for fish?" He demanded.  
  
Yamcha opened his mouth to retort, and then quickly shut it when he realized he had nothing to answer with. He hit himself with an open palm on the back of his head and swore. "Damn pain!" He said. "Piss off!" The small, throbbing pain at the back of his skull had suddenly gotten worse.  
  
"You too?" Kuririn asked, likewise rubbing his head.  
  
"Yeah." Yamcha replied, flinching as it went up a notch.  
  
"I wonder what's causing it."  
  
A sudden flash of lightning burst outside the window followed by a huge blaze of blue fire. The lights in the room exploded in a shower of broken glass.  
  
"What in the name of Kami was that?" Shouted Kuririn in the sudden darkness.  
  
"Oh, no. Not more glass." Yamcha muttered, brushing at the floor with the toe of his sneaker. "At least this time I'm wearing shoes." He pushed at the glass littering the floor some more. He hissed suddenly and grabbed at his head as sharp pains stabbed through the back of his skull.  
  
Kuririn echoed his cry. "Damn, that hurt!" He almost shouted.  
  
Casalin rushed over to the monitors by Son Gohan's bed, afraid that the power surge had knocked them out. But no, they were still working, monitoring the slow, steady heartbeat and low body functions. But the drip needed changing. "I'm going to get some more saline and another unit of blood." She told them, heading in the direction of what she hoped was the door.  
  
"To your left." Said Vegeta.  
  
Wordlessly, she followed his advice and quickly found the door. Pulling it open, she thanked him over her shoulder.  
  
Vegeta just grunted.  
  
She returned a moment later with a torch lamp and new saline and blood units. Half closing the door behind her, she turned on the torch and the room was immediately lit with a bright yellow-white light. "The emergency breakers will start up soon." she said, placing the units on the small table beside Son Gohan's bed. "Now let's clean up all this glass." She moved over to the now collapsed cupboard and pulled from out the wreckage a small brush and shovel. She handed it to Yamcha. "Here." She said, smiling at him. "Make yourself useful."  
  
Yamcha looked down at the cleaning utensils in his hands, then at Casalin who still had a smile playing around the corners of her lips. Shrugging, he smiled back; a sucker for a pretty face, and bent down to sweep up the glass shards. The pain in the back of his head seemed to be ebbing now, and wasn't causing him anything extremely painful save a slight discomfort.  
  
"How'd you do that?" Asked the aquamarine-haired woman as Casalin moved over to Son Gohan's bed, turned off and disconnected the I.V tube from the current saline pack then clipped it into the full one. Hooking it back up on the hanger suspended above and to the side of the machine that monitored the pressure of the liquid, she clicked the machine back on to resume dripping the saline solution in measured amounts into the tube, then turned and smiled at the woman. "Do what?" She asked.  
  
The woman motioned towards the cleaning Yamcha. "Get him to work. I've been trying for years."  
  
Casalin smiled and shrugged. "Ever tried asking him?"  
  
The woman frowned and contemplated, then, her blue eyes wide, she looked over to where Yamcha was sweeping the shards into a pile. "Well no. I always ordered him to do it 'cause he never did. I guess I just never bothered to ask him."  
  
Casalin inclined her head. "You learn new things every day." She said. Then, abruptly, she held out her hand. "You already know this," She said. "But my name's Casalin."  
  
The woman smiled, and took Casalin's hand in her own. "I'm Bulma."  
  
Casalin returned the smile. "It's nice to meet you, Bulma." She then looked around the room. "Other than the exception of Mrs. Son, I know who the rest of you are."  
  
"Chi Chi."  
  
Casalin turned to face Gokou's bed. "Excuse me?" She asked.  
  
"Chi Chi." The woman repeated. "My name is Chi Chi."  
  
Casalin snapped her fingers. "That's right!" She cried delightedly. "You're Gyuu-Maou's daughter, aren't you?"  
  
Chi Chi blinked, then smiled. "Why, yes." Then her slender, dark brows creased in confusion. "But how did you know?"  
  
Casalin grinned at Chi Chi, who had once again snuggled into Gokou's lap. "I'm a Budokai fan." She replied, shrugging. "I remember all of you." She looked back over her shoulder at Gohan's bed. "I remember Kuririn and how he came third in I think it was the twenty-first tournament." She looked at the fairly surprised fighter. "Am I right?" She asked.  
  
Kuririn swallowed, then nodded. "Yep." He replied. "Only it's Krillin. Kuririn was what the Oorin temple monks called me. Personally, I think Krillin sounds better."  
  
"Hey!" Called Yamcha from the floor. "You never told me that."  
  
"Well, you never asked." replied Krillin.  
  
"And," Continued Casalin. "I remember Yamcha from the Budokai's and the West Kong Taitans."  
  
Yamcha smiled up at her. "League fan, huh?" He asked.  
  
"Not really," She replied, smiling sheepishly. "Just one of the many Yamcha fans. Do you know just how many web-sites you've got out there?"  
  
Yamcha blushed while Krillin laughed at him.  
  
The Demon King and Vegeta snorted through their noses.  
  
Gokou had fallen asleep.  
  
"I remember Ma Junior over there," She motioned towards the frowning Devil. "Mostly because he was the cutest-looking green-guy I'd ever seen. Of course," She added, ignoring Krillin's hysterical laughter that threatened to send him tumbling off the bed. "I was only nine at the time."  
  
The Demon King snorted again.  
  
Yamcha, chuckling away to himself about Piccolo being labeled as 'cute', and at the usage of his old name, had just finished sweeping up all the shards of broken light-bulb that he could find when the pain in the back of his head, quiet until now, thundered through his skull. He immediately fell back onto his rear on the floor and clutched at his head, his sight exploding with red lights. He gasped, then let out a howl of pain.  
  
"Fuck!" He screamed.  
  
Casalin turned just in time to see Krillin fall off of Gohan's bed and onto the cold linoleum floor, clutching at his head and grimacing in pain. Taking a moment to analyse the scene, she quickly called for Chi Chi.  
  
The young woman came up beside her.  
  
"What are we going to do?" She asked  
  
Casalin pulled Chi Chi down beside Yamcha and placed the woman's right hand on his forehead. "Just keep your hand there." She told her. Then she quickly moved over to where Krillin was writhing on the floor and dragged him over to Yamcha and Chi Chi. Once there, she sat on the smaller mans chest and placed her left hand on his forehead.  
  
"Now listen carefully," She told Chi Chi. "You know how your mind is clear that small moment before you gather your energy for an attack?"  
  
Chi Chi nodded.  
  
"Well, try to do that. Try and keep your mind clear and your energies dormant. What I'm going to try to do is take away their pain, and hopefully," She added quietly. "I wont hurt you in the process." She looked over at Chi Chi who stared at her, afraid. "I want you to close your eyes. When I grab your hand you're going to feel a gentle pull. It will get stronger, but it shouldn't hurt."  
  
Chi Chi nodded and exhaled slowly. She closed her eyes.  
  
/All right./ Casalin thought to herself. /Here it goes./ As she reached out and grasped Chi Chi's hand she caught the dark obsidian glance of her Prince, silent communication passing between them before she too closed her eyes. Instantly, she felt a tug, and then her mind was flooded with white-hot pain. Bearing it with searing agony, she searched through the pain to its source, and quickly shut it off. But something went wrong, and her pain didn't cease with the other two's. She stiffened, and abruptly let go of Chi Chi's hand.  
  
To Piccolo, Vegeta and Bulma the sight looked strange indeed. One moment it was Krillin and Yamcha who were shuddering in agony, and the next it was Casalin who was trembling with it, and the two warriors were silent. Abruptly, Casalin let go of Chi Chi's hand and stood, eyes wide and body stiff, and faced the window that over-looked West Kong. "Someone's coming." She said quietly, then she threw back her head, screamed, and a white-hot flash of energy burst momentarily around her, only to vanish as quickly as it had come.  
  
Confused, and still feeling the after-effects of that incredible pain, Krillin and Yamcha picked themselves up off the floor.  
  
"What just happened?" Yamcha asked, shaking his head.  
  
Casalin smiled sympathetically. "You were picking up strange frequency ki signals that are approaching." She said calmly to them. "Don't worry, I changed your reception signal slightly so it wont hurt as much."  
  
Krillin and Yamcha shared a perplexed glance, then looked over at Vegeta.  
  
He smirked at them. "Naichi-jin also have very strong mental stability. What she means is that she altered your pathetic perceptions enough so that you can still detect the ki, only with less pain."  
  
"Oh." Replied Yamcha and Krillin in unison.  
  
"Your senses are strange." She told them, her voice puzzled. "They're not as finely tuned as ours," She said, referring to her and Vegeta. "But they have a more extensive range. Very peculiar."  
  
Yamcha shrugged, but sure enough, when he felt out with his mind for the strange ki signatures, he could detect them with only a slight twinge of something remotely like pain.  
  
"Do you feel that?" Asked Krillin from beside him.  
  
"Mmhm." He replied, facing the window, his eyes fixed unseeingly out into the darkness beyond. "It's kinda strange, but then very familiar."  
  
"Yeah," Agreed Krillin. "One of them sorta feels like Piccolo, only - I dunno - different." He paused. "Suppose it could be another Namek?"  
  
"Uh-uh." Replied Yamcha, dark eyes searching the darkness for any sign of the ki bearers. "No Namek's power level is that high. And if it was a Namek, wouldn't Piccolo be able to feel it?"  
  
"I can't detect anything." Confirmed Piccolo, joining them at the window.  
  
Vegeta crossed his arms and moved to stand beside Yamcha and Krillin. "Where are the signals going?" He asked.  
  
"Well," Yamcha replied. "As far as I can tell, they're heading this way."  
  
Vegeta sighed through his nose. "You're sure?" He growled.  
  
"Positive."  
  
Casalin looked over her shoulder at the four men lined up before the window, observing the out-of-season storm. She shook her head slightly, and then bent to tuck in the sleeping Gokou. Whatever the nurse had given him was working like a charm. He was sleeping like a baby.  
  
She leapt as the torch beside her exploded and the room was flooded with darkness once more.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The sky screamed as the wind howled and buffeted them, making it difficult to fly. The rain was like ice, stabbing them through the sodden layers of their clothes, freezing their blood and stiffening their muscles. But there was little they could do about it.  
  
They shot through the churning sky like silver bullets, the light from the storms raging around them, the thunder causing the air to ripple which continuously pushed them off course.  
  
"Where are they?" Screamed Krillin over the howling of the wind. He spat out a mouthful of the water that filled his mouth as soon as he opened it to speak. "Can you see them?"  
  
"No!" Gurgled back Peignoir, who flew alongside of him, her long braid thrusting out from the back of her head like a sword - the water had frozen between the strands, making it stiff. "Do you?"  
  
Krillin almost laughed, but if he held his mouth open for too long he would probably drown. "If I knew-" spit. "I wouldn't-" spit. "Be asking you- " spit. "Now would I?" He spat again.  
  
/But I can definitely feel something./  
  
Then abruptly something struck him from behind and he careened off course. He barely had time to straighten himself before he crashed face- first into a mountain. Narrowly missing the peak, he shot up higher into the sky and looked frantically about for his attacker. Then, through the dark locks that formed frozen cell-like bars over his eyes, he noticed something flying towards him. With no hesitation, by now knowing that it was a deadly fault, he shot his hands forward and blasted it. Not waiting to see whether the ki blast hit the creature or not, he turned and shot away. Energy flashed around him, melting the icicles in his hair and instantly drying his clothes, as he rocketed towards the others - who had halted in mid-air and were waiting for him - like an undead Majin Buu was hot on his tail.  
  
Piccolo, watching Krillin race towards them, picked up on the something that was wrong, and shot off ahead, yelling behind to Peignoir.  
  
"Move!!"  
  
Peignoir, taking barely a moment to realize what was happening, shot off after Piccolo, barely a moment behind, Krillin jetting alongside her hips.  
  
"Can you feel that?" Roared Piccolo back to them. "They're right in front of us!"  
  
"Yeah?" Yelled Krillin up to him. "Well, there's someone else right behind!"  
  
"I know!" Came back Piccolo's voice. "But I was referring to Gokou and the others!"  
  
"Oh!" Shouted back Krillin. "I think we should step on it 'cause this guy's getting closer!"  
  
He chanced a look back and saw that, indeed, the monster was a lot closer than he had thought, and that if he dropped back a meter he'd be right on top of the guy.  
  
"Arrrggghhhhhh!" Krillin screamed and shot up beside Piccolo with a sudden unexpected burst of ki. "Where are they? Where are they?" He asked rapidly as they shot towards a city that glowed like a flood light in the dark.  
  
Piccolo pointed with one white-clawed finger at a tall, thick building, grey through the rain. "The hospital. The third window on the right."  
  
"The right?" Repeated Krillin. "Your right or my right?"  
  
"Just the right!" Piccolo screamed. "Now hurry!" He hoped that window was the right one. It felt about right.  
  
"Which floor?" Krillin demanded.  
  
"Fourth." Replied Piccolo, now certain of their location.  
  
A sudden scream from behind him caused them to turn back.  
  
Peignoir's boot was caught in the grip of a pale-faced, white-haired elemental with silver eyes that flashed and reflected the streaks of lightning tearing the clouds around them. He was grinning maliciously at her, his right arm drawn back and fingers clawed. Peignoirs face darkened with fury and she moved her hands up above her head, then brought them down directly into the elementals face, pale blue ki shooting out from her palms and surrounding his head.  
  
Abruptly, the hand let her go and she shot away out of his reach.  
  
The smoke was quickly yanked away by the savage wind, exposing the elementals carbon-dusted face that emitted such unbelievable waves of anger and hatred that even Piccolo trembled uncontrollably.  
  
"That wasn't wise." He murmured, his voice deep and chillingly cold. He raised a pale fist to his lips and wiped away a smear of pale blue blood. Then he grinned. "Allow me to show you the correct way." Then, through the violent screaming of the raging wind and freezing torrents of icy rain, the air began to thrum.  
  
"Oh, no!" Cried Krillin. "He's powering up!"  
  
"Damn this!" Swore Piccolo, realizing that if they were ever going to attack this alien, now would be the right time. "Ready?" He asked Krillin and Peignoir. Before they even nodded he had drawn in the necessary amount of energy needed for his attack, and was on the verge of releasing it when he felt powers being condensed on both his sides as Krillin on his right and Peignoir on his left gathered their energies. Suddenly, the ki lashing within him like an uncontrollable demented whip, it broke free and burst forward as the air around him thrummed with his bellowing yell of; "Makankosappo!"  
  
"Ki-en-zan!" Krillin cried, a flat yellow disk of burning ki hot on the energy wave of Piccolo's two-ki attack, as Peignoir, on the other side of the giant Namek, unleashed her cry.  
  
"Renzoku!" She screamed as ki bolts of uncountable numbers shot in rapid succession from her palms.  
  
The three totally separate attacks travelled as one across the small distance to strike the surprised and unprepared elemental who was suddenly engulfed in blue, yellow, white and purple-hued explosions.  
  
Piccolo, not wasting any time, grasped Krillin and Peignoir around their wrists and turned, racing towards the hospital. A few seconds later he threw them ahead of him and turned around, flying backwards, to blast the turbulent explosion behind him. There was no way, in this time or any other, that he was going to let any pale-faced, wind-loving asshole harm anyone he knew or cared about. Not again. He screamed as he soared backwards, bright yellow ki blasting from his hands, murderous rage intensifying within him until it felt as though he had a storm of his own in equal magnitude to the one around him, raging in his soul. He'd be damned if they'd do it again. Damned to Hell if he wasn't already.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
"They're coming." Murmured Yamcha in the sudden darkness.  
  
The door to the room abruptly banged open as Tienshinhan and an old man rushed into the private ward, light from the torch-lit corridor beyond flaring within the room momentarily before the door closed behind them. Tien's face, in that instant of light, was pale and drawn, his eyes dull and red-rimmed.  
  
Piccolo turned from the window. "How is he?" He asked, Yamcha, Krillin and Vegeta still staring out the window, inattentive, silently observing the tempestuous night.  
  
Tien swallowed, opened his mouth to reply, choked, then fell silent.  
  
Piccolo said nothing. He understood, even if the only person he had ever felt that way about was lying, dead in a manner of speaking, in the bed beside him. The wires running to and through him the only things keeping the boy alive. He felt so helpless. Then suddenly, his contemplation was broken by a small shout beside him.  
  
"There!" Cried Bulma. "Did you see that?" She was pointing out the window to where a flash of lightning had been a moment before.  
  
"What?" Asked Master Roshi, moving in behind them.  
  
"It looked like a blast of ki." Vegeta observed.  
  
"It was." Replied Yamcha, his eyes never leaving the window.  
  
There was another flash of pale blue lightening.  
  
"There!" Yelled Krillin, his arm shooting out to point. "There they are!"  
  
Everybody leaned closer, eyes delving deep into the inky cloud and sparking sky.  
  
"I thought I could feel something." Murmured Tien.  
  
Casalin stood beside Chi Chi, staring out the window. She could feel it too, now. Ever since she had briefly touched upon Yamcha and Krillin's minds, she had been able to detect it. She concentrated harder. If she didn't move her eyes, kept them unfocused, unblinking, she could faintly detect movement. Then, suddenly, the sky erupted in a blaze of rupturing colours.  
  
Chi Chi gasped. "I - I felt that!" She breathed. "That was - huge."  
  
Vegeta stepped back from the window.  
  
"Kuso!" He cried. "What the hell is that?"  
  
Krillin and Yamcha started moving back. "I suggest," Started Krillin, eyes never leaving the bursting colours exploding in the sky. "That we all move away from the window."  
  
The others had just started taking their advice when another blast of ki lit up the sky and the hospital room with bright yellow light.  
  
"What the -" Started Piccolo.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
"The - the window!" Screamed Krillin as the force of Piccolo's throw sent him and Peignoir careening uncontrollably towards the hospital window.  
  
Suddenly, ki blasting from his hands, propelling him backwards faster than he could fly, Piccolo shot past them, his face creased and illuminated with fury.  
  
"The window!" Repeated Krillin.  
  
He raised his hands to shield his face.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
"What the -?"  
  
He couldn't finish. Before he could get the last word from out between his lips, three figures bore down from out of the storm-tossed sky and careened towards them.  
  
A blur of white glowing with bright yellow energies dominated the view out of the window before crashing through the glass pane, flying through the room and smashing into the mutilated cupboard. Getting suddenly up, the green and white giant figure skidded through the glass littering the centre of the room to reach out and grasp two other figures that came flying unexpectedly through what was left of the window, screaming their heads off. The figure dumped them unceremoniously onto the floor, then proceeded to blast bright burning bolts of ki out into the storm. The other two almost instantaneously leapt to their feet, joining the other, taller figure in blasting the unseen assailant.  
  
Suddenly, they stopped. The tallest of them lowered his hands in relief, sighing. Then he growled.  
  
The room was silent as it's surprised occupants looked from figure to figure, face-to-face, green-skinned Namek to green-skinned Namek.  
  
"What the hell?" Demanded Vegeta.  
  
"Is - is that Piccolo?" Squeaked Bulma, sticking her head out from behind the Saiya-jin Prince.  
  
The room was suddenly illuminated by a ball of white light that danced just above Yamcha's head.  
  
Krillin swallowed, then stared. "And I suppose you're me?" He yelled at the short man with dark hair.  
  
"It is Piccolo!" Squealed Bulma, scuttling away from the three figures in the centre of the room.  
  
Piccolo growled. "I take it you're not from Trunks' future?" He asked.  
  
The other Piccolo shook his head.  
  
"Who's future are you from, then?" Demanded Kamesennin.  
  
"Yours." Replied the woman with long green hair.  
  
There was more silence.  
  
"I think you better sit down." Said the future Piccolo.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The wind whipped his white hair savagely.  
  
Silver eyes surveyed the hospital from a distance as pale hands the colour of cream wiped dark soot smudges from his features. The rain intensified in violence, but the elemental scarcely felt it. To him it was barely noticeable, a minor pleasantry. Warm and inviting against his skin. His eyes narrowed beneath frosty-white brows.  
  
Those aliens, those Humans, were creatures to worry about. They knew things, knew how to hide their powers completely from them. The Humans. They were the dangerous ones. Those Saiya-jin were less of a problem. Although they could lower their powers - they couldn't disguise them completely. They had so far only had one problem with a Saiya-jin, and that one had been dealt with pretty easily. But then it was revealed that the Humans planned to go back in time to unleash that ones dormant power when he was a child and it was still possible to do so. They planned to absorb it into that ball and take it back to infuse in one of their other half- breeds, the time in the past selected critically due to the fact that it would take the child merely a few days to recover what power he'd had stolen from him.  
  
Their plan had been in dangerous certainty of succeeding.  
  
And it was only due to the agent within the underground of Capsule Corporation, and the timely 'leak' of information, that they were prepared for the launching of the time ship. If they had known sooner, they'd have been able to sabotage the ship, and then they wouldn't have had to follow them back to this time. But they had done something better. Instead of tampering with the ship, they had altered the purpose of the ball that they had so carefully constructed. Instead of it absorbing the power of the boy, it would infuse one of them into him, forcing his mind out of his body, and then leave it himself so that the body was mindless, therefore powerless, and then the boy could join his future self in his sad and pointless death.  
  
The elemental laughed. Sad indeed! Sad that it was so simple a thing to do. But damn those Humans! And the half-breeds were even worse! They were too strong for him together in a group like that. It would be foolish for him to press his attack prematurely. He must wait just a little longer. Time was no problem, but the recovery of that brat was.  
  
The air suddenly became heavier as great chunks of hail crashed down from the sky above him as he felt another being slide up to him.  
  
"Squall." The elemental greeted emotionlessly, not looking at the visitor. His silver eyes were still fixed stonily upon the building that he could feel the Human's cowering within.  
  
"Blizzard." Squall replied.  
  
Blizzard's eyes now turned away from the building and hovered over the other elemental.  
  
His deep blue hair was being whipped savagely by the winds, but like Blizzard, Squall did not care. His skin was not much darker than Blizzards, a pale tan, and he was only a little shorter than the white-haired elemental.  
  
Blizzard scowled at him as their eyes met, and an immediate battle of the stares ensued. Squall was the first to look away.  
  
"What have you to report?" Blizzard demanded, a cruel and satisfied smirk twisting his lips. Squall returned the glare for a moment before letting his eyes drop to the tip of the white-haired elementals nose. "We have located Capsule Corp." He replied, his voice warm and soft despite his element and his well-clipped words. "Now all we have to do is wait."  
  
Blizzard nodded. "You have done well, warrior." He said coolly.  
  
Squall lifted his stare back to the elementals ice silver eyes.  
  
"Now I want you to search out the Kami of this place." He continued.  
  
Squalls eyes widened slightly.  
  
"And I want you to destroy him." Blizzards voice ended dispassionately.  
  
Squall bowed quickly, his hair falling forward to obscure his face. When he straightened his features were once again calm, composed, and cold. "As you wish, General." He replied, turning away.  
  
Blizzard watched the younger elemental leave, disappearing into the storm in a blaze of hail. He frowned. There was something wrong with that warrior... something strange, but Blizzard just couldn't put his finger on what it was. He'd been acting a little differently for a while now, and even though he was one of Blizzard's most trusted soldiers, something about him was beginning to make him lose that trust. He'd need watching, though. Very close watching.  
  
His thoughts were suddenly interrupted as two more elementals flew up to him. "Report." He demanded without looking at them.  
  
"General." Replied the green-haired male, saluting and attempting a small mid-air bow.  
  
"Well, what is it, Captain?" He asked, becoming annoyed.  
  
The green-haired Captain cleared his throat and moved slightly forward. "Satan City has been deprived of power."  
  
Blizzard nodded. "Well done, Hurricane." He congratulated coldly, icy wind frosting out from between his lips. "And you, Tempest? What have you to report?"  
  
Her voice whispered and roared like the sea when she replied. "The Zenith High Empath has been exterminated."  
  
At this Blizzard turned to face them. "Are you sure?" He asked slowly, silver eyes boring coldly into her own dark green.  
  
Tempest nodded, her pale lavender hair swirling about her face in billowing purple waves. "His soul will not be rejoining his body."  
  
Blizzard flew forwards. "Has his body been destroyed?" He demanded.  
  
Tempest looked away, out into the distance, before returning them back to Blizzards lips. "I cannot be certain." She replied.  
  
"Well, find out!" Blizzard roared, his face bellowing his displeasure, icicles suddenly bursting into existence around him. "The Emperor can not be allowed to live!"  
  
Tempest bowed, hiding her shamed and guilty expression behind the waves of her hair. "Immediately, sir." She replied, her voice cold and watery. She turned and disappeared into the darkness of the storm.  
  
"Do you wish me to follow her?" Asked Hurricane.  
  
"No." Replied Blizzard, shaking his head. "She is loyal." He stared out into the storm where she had disappeared moments before. "It is Squall I want you to watch."  
  
Hurricane nodded. "As you wish." He replied, and he too disappeared into the storm.  
  
Blizzard once again turned his cold, pale eyes to the building that contained his cowering enemies. Then, for no reason, he laughed, loudly, maliciously and insanely into the wind.  
  
The laugh continued on for long minutes, even after the elemental had disappeared, like the others, into the murky dark. 


	4. A Little Chaos is Good For You

A/N: Hmmm, was there a little Matrix angst in that last chapter? Well, I wrote it around when The Matrix was released, so it was probably intentional on an unconscious level. This is the last chapter for a while. And I mean a while! Probably about a week or two seeming Chapter Five I actually have to write from semi-deciphered notes and not just type up from paper. Not to mention that I think it's going to be difficult to link up everything just right. Future and Past are really going to collide in the next one, and getting it to fit adequately is gonna take a while. But until then… enjoy! Warning though, this chapter might be a little disturbing in the beginning for a few people. There's the mention of a lot of blood. So if you don't think you'll like it, please don't read. As for me, I'm going to toddle off and start on the ficshots. I only wish I had a scanner…  
  
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CHAPTER FOUR  
  
A Little Chaos is Good For You  
  
  
  
Goten awoke at the sound of something in his room.  
  
He rolled over in the bed, throwing his arm out to grasp Pei-ju and pull her in towards him only to find the sheets beside him empty but still warm from her body.  
  
He sat up, the single sheet falling away from his body, and glanced about the room, locating her shadow at the end of the bed.  
  
"Pei-ju," He asked, worry in his voice. "What's wrong?" It was almost time for the child to be born, and Goten wasn't going to take any chances with a false labour. He heard Pei-ju stifle a sob, then felt her shift on the bed to turn to him.  
  
"Nothing." She replied, her voice soft and sweet in the darkness, but thick with tears.  
  
Goten pushed away the sheet and slid to the end of the bed. "Don't give me that, Juicey-chan." He said, sliding one arm around her bare shoulders. "Why are you crying?"  
  
She sniffed Goten pulled her in close. She let her head fall onto his shoulder. "I'm-I'm just scared."  
  
Goten looked down at her. "Scared of what?"  
  
She sniffed again. "Scared of what we're doing." She replied. "Scared of the life our child will have." She turned her head towards him, staring up into the shadows of his face. "Scared of where we're heading."  
  
Goten reached up and brushed a strand of her hair away from her eyes, then let his fingers stroke the contours of her face.  
  
"I love you." He said, his voice deep and thick. Pei-ju listened, and beneath the words she heard him whisper in her mind; /I'm scared too./  
  
"I love you, too." She whispered, wrapping her slender fingers around his wrist.  
  
Goten bent his head and kissed her softly, tongues touching and sliding against each other with the gentlest of caresses. Pei-ju sighed into his mouth, her lips responding to the teasing of his own with blissful patience.  
  
Suddenly, she tore her mouth away as a shuddering momentary pain ripped through her belly. She turned away, one hand on her distended abdomen, the other grasping the startled Goten's shoulder.  
  
"What's wrong?" He demanded. He turned his head. "Lights!" He shouted. They flashed on with brilliant luminescence.  
  
She gasped as the pain was repeated, ripping through her side and down her leg. Her fingers dug deeply into the flesh of Goten's shoulder as she hunched over, staring dumbly at the liquid soaking the bed sheets beneath her.  
  
"The water broke." She said at last, her voice numb. "And it's red."  
  
Goten stared disbelievingly down at the widening water-red stain beneath her, then lifted his wide dark eyes to her whitened face. "But, it's not-" He started.  
  
"No." She replied, her eyes not leaving the sheet beneath her. "Get help. Now!"  
  
Goten hesitated before leaving her. He wrapped a sheet around her body and lifted her further onto the bed, piling pillows behind her head. He then quickly pulled on a heavy pair of black track-pants. Running for the door, he turned back to her before passing through it.  
  
"I'm all right." She answered before he could ask. "Just go. Jade'll know what to do."  
  
Goten swallowed and nodded, then spun around and sprinted out of the room.  
  
Pei-ju released a painful breath, then gasped.  
  
"Kami." She moaned. "Oh, Kami..."  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
Goten had no time to waste.  
  
So frantic were his thoughts that he was halfway to Trunks and Jade's room before he remembered Shunkanido. Raising two fingers to his forehead, he concentrated on Trunks' ki and blinked out of space mid-stride.  
  
He appeared almost instantaneously in Trunks' and Jade's bedroom.  
  
"Lights!" He shouted.  
  
Trunks rolled over and sat up instantly. "What is it?" He asked, blinking owlishly up at Goten standing at the foot of his bed. Jade awoke a moment later.  
  
"It's Pei-ju." He replied frantically, his words emerging in a rapid jumble. "She's bleeding."  
  
Trunks stared at him, confused. "Bleeding?" He repeated. Goten had woken him up for that?  
  
"What?" Demanded Jade from beside him.  
  
"Her water's broken!" Goten shouted. "And she's haemorrhaging!" His face was stark white in the harsh cast of the artificial lighting.  
  
It took Trunks and Jade a moment for this to sink in.  
  
"She needs help!" Goten shouted. "There's no time!" He grasped the sheets covering Trunks and his wife and yanked them off the bed. Then he blinked out of sight.  
  
"Shit." Whispered Jade. "I'll get my things."  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The ripping pain was not repeated. With pillows under her head and the mattress beneath her, Pei-ju was quite comfortable. She desperately wished for something to drink, but she decided she'd better not get off the bed. If the pain came back she'd more than likely fall and cause even more damage to her insides, not to mention to her baby. As if to prove her thoughts true, a sudden pain shot through her belly and she felt the blood gush out from between her legs to saturate the mattress beneath her.  
  
Something's wrong.  
  
/Where's Goten?/ She asked herself. /He's been gone a few minutes but it feels like a week. Kami - there's the blood again. This is… I don't... Why isn't Goten back with Jade - she's a doctor, and at least I could have a drink of water, for Kami's sake, my throat feels like sandpaper./  
  
Another pain slashed through her and she bit her lip as the answering flow of blood gushed out.  
  
/Stop that kicking, my love, you don't have to act like a horse just because your father's one. Stop it! You're just making me bleed. Wait until Jade comes, then you can get out. Oh, Kami, oh, Kami - there's so much blood, so much.../  
  
"It sure was easier staring you than it is finishing you..." She gritted out, staring up at the ceiling for what felt like ageless minutes. She lifted her head and looked down at the sheets beneath her where a wide patch of red was spreading across the mattress. /Why is it red?/ She asked herself, her head spinning as if she were drunk. /Am I going to bleed to death here? Alone? Oh, Kami, more blood. At least it doesn't hurt quite as much anymore. But why does so much blood gush out? Kami! If this keeps up there'll be a river of blood, all over the floor, Goten and the others will have to wash their feet. Where the hell is he? As soon as this is over I am going to leave him. Running off and leaving me here dying of thirst all by myself. What kind of lover is that?/  
  
She felt her abdomen contract again.  
  
/Oh, Kami, the blood... I'm not going to lose hold of myself, I'm not, and I wont. I don't do that kind of thing. But.../  
  
"Kami!!!" She screamed as a larger pain than any of the others tore through her.  
  
/What was that?/ She asked herself suddenly. /Was that Goten?/ She lifted her head to see Goten standing at the foot of the bed, staring down at the widening red stain beneath her legs. His eyes met her face with stark fear. He rushed to her side and grasped one of her sweaty hands in his. Pushing her suddenly damp hair back from her shockingly white face, he smiled lovingly down at her.  
  
"It's going to be all right." He murmured to her. "The other's are coming."  
  
Pei-ju swallowed her dry throat and nodded. Now that Goten was back with her she could keep her sanity in a stronger grip. Her abdomen contracted and more blood gushed out.  
  
Suddenly Trunks and Jade popped into the room.  
  
Jade took one look at Pei-ju and her doctoring instincts took over immediately. She clambered onto the bed, spreading Pei-ju's legs and kneeling between them. While Jade quickly examined her, Trunks stood there indecisive. "Mother." He said simply.  
  
Jade looked over her shoulder at him and nodded.  
  
Trunks blinked out of existence.  
  
The green-haired doctor laid her hands on Pei-ju's belly just as another contraction had her arching up off the bed. Goten's face drained of all colour as his eyes remained fixed on his lovers face, her frighteningly weak hand gripped in his.  
  
Jade closed her eyes. She could feel the baby beneath her hands, struggling weakly. The placenta had already detached and the child was suffocating, deprived of oxygen. She had to get it out now. Damnitt, where were those senzu beans?  
  
Pan suddenly appeared beside her. "Goten woke me. What can I do?" She asked breathlessly.  
  
Jade looked at her quickly, then turned back to Pei-ju. "Get me some surgical gloves, a sharp knife from the kitchen, and Dende's senzu beans - if there're any left."  
  
Pan nodded, then disappeared.  
  
A minute later Trunks reappeared. "She's gone!" He exclaimed.  
  
"Who?" Replied Jade non-committingly, stroking the sides of Pei-ju's stomach, trying to relieve some of the pain.  
  
"Kassan." He answered.  
  
Jade's reply was interrupted by the sudden arrival of Pan and the items she had requested.  
  
"Good." She said. "Now, Goten, I want you to hold her still. Pan, you get on the other side and do the same." They both nodded. "Trunks." She said over her shoulder to her husband. "I want you over here to hold down her legs. She's not to move an inch!" she stressed. She moved up higher over Pei-ju's body to sit on her thighs, lending some of her weight to her knees so as not to put too much pressure on the woman's legs. Trunks moved up behind her to hold down her lower legs.  
  
Jade picked up a small brown-cloth bag beside the knife. "These the beans?" She asked Pan.  
  
Pan nodded. "There's only three left." She replied as Jade pulled on the gloves.  
  
"Dende can spare one." She shot back. She looked at Goten. "Goten!" She shouted. "Heat this for me!"  
  
Goten turned towards her and shot a beam of ki at the knife that she held in her hand. A moment later the wooden handle began to singe.  
  
"That's enough." She told him. "Now hold her tight - this will not be painless."  
  
/Damnitt!/ She thought to herself as she pulled the sheet away from Pei-ju's body. /If only we had time to administer a sedative!/ She swallowed and lowered the searing hot knife to Pei-ju's distended belly, stroking it along her flesh.  
  
The scream that tore from Pei-ju's throat was lost, tortured. Goten's echoing cry choked in his throat, emerging as a strangled howl.  
  
Before the sound was gone, Jade was holding a blood-covered baby in her hands. She blew into the baby's mouth, once, twice, three times. The baby's arms jerked, then it's legs. Swiftly, Jade cut the umbilical cord with the still hot knife.  
  
"Thank Kami." Whispered Trunks from behind her as she cauterised the cord with her ki.  
  
"Pan," Said Jade to the young woman. "Take the boy and wrap him in a warm blanket."  
  
Pan stared wide-eyed as Jade handed her the small blood-covered boy and shot her a relieved smile. "Just in time." The green-haired woman sighed.  
  
Pan nodded and smiled, then turned away to find something warm to wrap the baby in.  
  
Jade pulled off the gloves, then pulled out a senzu bean from the bag. She gave it to Goten to give to Pei-ju.  
  
Goten smiled grimly, then gently pushed the bean into Pei-ju's mouth. "Eat it, love." He whispered to her. "It will heal you."  
  
Pei-ju stared up at him with feverish green eyes, then bit down hard on the candy-like bean. Immediately, before their eyes, the wounds Jade had made to free the baby began to heal, the skin sealing itself together. The flow of blood between her legs stopped as the flesh and skin of Pei-ju's stomach knitted itself into a shiny silver scar, then disappeared altogether, her abdomen once again becoming wash-board flat and toned, not one sign of stretch-marks visible. The whiteness of her skin and her feverish features abated, and a few seconds later Pei-ju was staring up at them as if she had just awoken from a long and peaceful nap.  
  
Goten stared down at her, tears streaming from his eyes as he gathered her into his arms. "Damnitt," He said into her hair. "We could so easily have lost you."  
  
Pei-ju hummed into his throat, then pulled back.  
  
"Did I hear right?" She asked. "Did I hear 'A boy'?"  
  
"You sure did!" Replied Pan, re-entering the room with a fluffy blanket-wrapped bundle. "He's still a little bloodied," She said. "But, man - is he cute!" She gently passed the bundle into Pei-ju's arms.  
  
She stared down at her son, taking in for the first time the tuft of black hair that shot up from his head in black, sticky spikes, and the large dark brown eyes that stared up at her in wonder.  
  
"Gokou." She said automatically. "We'll call him Gokou." Then she looked up at Goten. "If that's all right?"  
  
Goten smiled down at her. "It's perfect." He replied.  
  
Jade leaned back into Trunks' arms and sighed wearily. "You might as well go back to sleep." She told him quietly. "Pan and I'll clean up here."  
  
"You sure?" He murmured into her ear.  
  
She nodded. "You go ahead."  
  
Trunks smiled against her and kissed her neck. "I'll wait up." He told her, giving her one last hug.  
  
"Don't bother." She replied.  
  
Trunks left and Pan and Jade set to work cleaning up the birthing mess. Pan wrapped up the placenta in the bloodied sheets and incinerated them with a concentrated blast of ki, while Jade cleaned the mattress with one of Bulma's strange cleaning devices, and made the bed with new sheets around the huddled forms of Goten, Pei-ju and Gokou.  
  
Then, with Gokou finally washed and swaddled in a warm nightgown and nappy, Pan and Jade left, leaving the new family to enjoy the aftermath of their very close call.  
  
Above ground, the storm raged.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
The darkness in which they floated swum as if a huge boulder had been dropped into its water-like existence. A giant, high-pitched crying screamed loudly in their ears, paining them, even though they knew in this place that they didn't really have any.  
  
"What was that?" Cried Gohan, His fingers tightening around the Emperor's arm.  
  
He could hear the fear in the small mime's voice as he replied. "I don't know."  
  
Abruptly, the screaming stopped and they were once again left in the endless quiet.  
  
"That-that was scary." Mumbled Gohan.  
  
"Tell me about it." Replied Chao-tzu. "This place is the most frightening I've ever been in - and I've been in a few."  
  
Gohan sighed, and sent them bobbing again. "I wonder if there's anything else in this blackness other than us."  
  
"Judging by that scream," Replied Chao-tzu in his high-pitched voice. "I'd say that there is."  
  
Gohan fell silent. "I miss Kassan." He said a moment later.  
  
Chao-tzu sighed. "I wish I knew mine." He replied.  
  
He felt Gohan's hair brush against his cheek as the Demi-Saiya-jin turned his head to face him. "You never knew your kassan?" He asked disbelievingly.  
  
Chao-tzu shook his head. "No. Tien's been the only parent I've ever known."  
  
Gohan sighed and frowned. "That's so sad." He replied. "My kassan's always been there, but my tousan's died on my twice. I don't know how many times he's planning on leaving or dying on us again, but he hurts my mum each time he does it." Gohan's voice was thick, either with pain or anger.  
  
The darkness swum as Chao-tzu shook his head. "Gokou had good reasons for both of the times he was gone."  
  
"I know." Replied Gohan. "But he was still gone. The first time Piccolo killed him. Piccolo! And I didn't know for a long time afterwards. I thought he was just sick or something. And the second... We didn't know. Even though it turned out that he wasn't really dead he might as well've been!"  
  
Chao-tzu felt more than heard the grief and pain in the young boy's voice. Reaching out with his mind he soothed the child's turmoil of thoughts with images of love and feelings of warmth, security, and above all - friendship.  
  
/He loves you./ The mime whispered soothingly into his mind. /And that's all that matters./  
  
Gohan sniffed beside him, then Chao-tzu felt him smile. "Thanks." He said. "I know he loves me, but, still... you know?"  
  
Chao-tzu smiled, though he doubted that Gohan could tell - not even Saiya-jin eyes would be able to penetrate the darkness that they were within. "I know." He replied.  
  
Another ripple was carried through the dark ocean they were swimming within, and they bobbed off again, drifting off into the sleep that took them away from the emptiness that surrounded them, and into the dreamland built upon their histories and their imaginations.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
"So what you're saying," Said Yamcha. "Is that you came back from the future to absorb Gohan's ki into some strange ball and then transfer it into someone else back home?"  
  
Future Krillin nodded. "That's just about how it goes."  
  
Everyone suddenly became aware of a fuming Chi Chi standing by the unconscious Gokou's bed. "Then you," she ground out from between tightly clenched teeth, staring out at them with dark eyes that burned with anger. "Did this to my son!"  
  
Future Krillin, Piccolo and Peignoir took startled steps back, as did all the others. They knew what Chi Chi was like when she was annoyed, but when she was angry she was just plain frightening.  
  
"Something went wrong." Said Future Piccolo. "Instead of Gohan's ki going into the ball, something came out of it. We don't know what it is, yet, but we've got to find a way to bring him out of the coma, and fast. A battle's heading our way and it's not going to be such an easy one to win."  
  
"About these elementals," Started Tien. "Just how strong are they?"  
  
Peignoir sighed. "Not very strong on their own." She replied. "But as a group they are extremely difficult. Being elementals they can make battling conditions very unfavourable." She looked out the window into the shuddering sky. "Try fighting blind in a blizzard when your senses don't work."  
  
Tien whistled between his teeth. "Damn." He murmured.  
  
Future Piccolo glanced unemotionally around the room. Bulma was still cowering behind Vegeta; the Saiya-jin Prince appearing relatively calm compared to what would have been his usual attitude at the time. Chi Chi had once again turned towards her unconscious son, oblivious to nearly everything around her - including the wind howling into the room through the broken window. Gokou was still unconscious, snoring away merrily in the hospital bed, and the others were gathered around, faces relaying their confusion and hesitation to accept them for who they said they were.  
  
Future Krillin couldn't hold himself back any longer. All restraints forgotten in his excitement and pleasure at seeing his friends again, he rushed forwards and flung himself at Yamcha, giving the perplexed young man a giant bear hug.  
  
Future Piccolo smiled to himself as he watched Yamcha scuttle back from the over-bearing little man and move in close to Tien. He couldn't blame him. It was exhilaratingly awesome to see them all together again, healthy, young, alive. It had been so long. Even Kamesennin Mutenroushi was here. Back home he had disappeared years ago. Strangely enough, he felt like hugging them himself, but he suppressed that typically human urge, and contented himself with just watching them and smiling.  
  
Then his eyes fell on the other hospital bed. The one containing the youngest of them all.  
  
Future Piccolo swallowed.  
  
Gohan.  
  
Whenever he thought of the boy his mind was assailed by a multitude of images and memories - primarily those of him when he was a kid. Pictures flashed through his mind now, glimpses of past events as clear and fresh as if yesterday. Gohan, five years old, his face swollen and bruised, his body thrashed, inviting him to his birthday party. A few months later, facing his fears and standing up to Nappa, despite the fact that the aliens were a lot stronger than they thought they could ever be. Then, later, shoving himself in Frieza's face, afraid but knowing that it was what he had to do. The first expression of insane fury to cross his face as he destroyed his Saiya-jin uncles' space-pod; the fear in his eyes as he gazed up into his face for the first time; and the pleasure with which he greeting him when he arrived on Namek-sei. The anger that burned within him as he faced Cell; the confidence with which he stood up to Buu; and the caring and consideration he showed to everyone.  
  
It was disturbing to see him lain so low.  
  
It had been twenty-five years since he'd last heard his laugh, seen his smile, challenged him to a fight. He pretended it no longer hurt, but there was no use denying it. His Gohan was a shell in a tank. There was nothing about it that wasn't painful.  
  
He tore his eyes from the boy's face before he found it impossible to look away. His eyes fell almost instantly on Chi Chi.  
  
Inwardly, he smiled. She was the strongest woman he had ever known. Inwardly as well as physically, although as yet she had not yet discovered her potential. Then he frowned. Unfortunately, her connections with people were just as strong, especially with Gohan, and when his mind went... there was no way to pull her back. They tried, Gokou tried so hard, but she was gone. Future Piccolo sighed, watching as she silently lamented over her husband and only child.  
  
/Come on, Gohan. She's lost you once, don't let her lose you again./  
  
He knew how much she cared for him. Enough that it took her years to trust him. /Fifteen years./ He smirked slightly, remembering the various instruments, cooking utensils and threats she had used to keep him away from Gohan, and vice versa.  
  
"Didn't work for very long." he mumbled.  
  
The kid had always found some way to come visit him. Sneaking out late at night, lying to his mother. The kid had potential.  
  
His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the pink-haired nurse that entered the room carrying a tray of mugs filled with what looked and smelled like coffee. She put the tray down on the stool at the foot of Gokou's cot, straightened, then smiled.  
  
"Sorted everything out now?" She asked.  
  
Peignoir looked away from where she and Vegeta were staring at each other with identical frowns on their lips and fixed her with a hard stare.  
  
"Who are you?" She demanded, not one for courtesy.  
  
The nurse's eyes narrowed momentarily, before a smile replaced her frown and she crossed the room, stopping before her. She held out her hand. "My name's Casalin."  
  
Peignoir frowned slightly, shrugged, then took the woman's hand in hers.  
  
Future Piccolo frowned. Peignoir was never usually this nice on first acquaintance unless she had something up her sleeve. "Pen." He warned.  
  
She shot him an annoyed look before turning back to the nurse. "Peignoir." She replied politely, a smile curving her lips. Suddenly, she tightened her grip on the other woman's fingers and smirked, expecting her to yell in pain and struggle to get her hand free.  
  
Casalin's smile broadened. "Nice to meet you." She answered genuinely.  
  
Peignoir frowned, then grimaced as her hand was squeezed in return.  
  
Casalin released Peignoir's hand, then moved back over to the drinks. The green-haired woman held her hand by the wrist and squeezed it into a fist experimentally a few times. "Ow!" She mouthed to Future Piccolo, who smiled in her direction.  
  
"Coffee?" Someone asked.  
  
Peignoir looked back to see Casalin holding out a Styrofoam cup filled with sweet-smelling coffee.  
  
"Thanks." She replied, taking the cup and holding it in her other hand.  
  
"Anyone else?" She asked.  
  
The others all nodded, and she handed the cups out around the room. When she finally stood before the Future Piccolo, she shrugged. "Sorry. No coffee for you. The last thing I want is for your digestive system to conk out." She smiled at the Namek's confused expression. "The Doctor briefed me." She handed him one of the cups of water from the tray, then walked over to the other Piccolo and did the same.  
  
"Thanks." They both replied simultaneously. Piccolo scowled at his cup.  
  
Casalin smiled then turned away. She moved over to Gohan's bed and began checking the cables and the respirator, making sure that his skin was not becoming irritated and infected where the drips and probes had been inserted. She hummed while she was doing this, a familiar but nameless tune to a song that her mother used to sing to her when she was a child, and eventually all voices in the room quieted to listen to the softly murmured melody.  
  
Casalin was unaware of their observations of her as she cleaned the skin around the I.V insert needle, swabbing the raised flesh with alcohol, and rubbing the slightly red skin with a white antiseptic cream. She checked the monitors readouts, his heartbeat, blood pressure, respiratory functions, and looked sadly down into his expressionless face as she reaffixed the sensors to his temples to stabilize the brain functions monitor that was fluctuating slightly, and immediately the machine calmed down. She hummed a long sad note as she moved around Chi Chi to check that the saline drip plug inserted into the base of the half-filled bag was behaving correctly and releasing the right amount of saline every two seconds, and broke off suddenly when she saw them looking at her in the reflection on the bag. She turned around.  
  
"What?" She asked, perplexed.  
  
They were silent.  
  
"You're glowing." Said the bald Krillin suddenly.  
  
"Oh. What?" She asked, creasing her eyebrows.  
  
"You're glowing." He repeated. "It happened while you were humming. It's rather quite pretty."  
  
Master Roshi abruptly smacked Krillin on the back of the head.  
  
"Ow!" He yelled. "What was that for?"  
  
"I give the complements - not you!"  
  
Krillin shrugged, then turned his attention back to Casalin.  
  
She lifted one arm, her eyebrows still creased, and looked at her softly glowing fingers with a faint sheen of amusement. "Wow." She said breathlessly. "I wondered why I hadn't been glowing when I sang. Now I realize it was because I haven't been singing to anyone, just to myself." She laughed lightly. "Typical." She cast a glance back over her shoulder at the comatose boy. "Anyway... Gohan needs a bath, rub-down, and position change, and the physiologist will be in to exercise him later in the morning." She shrugged. "Right now there are more important things than wondering why I'm glowing now when I sing."  
  
"Like what?" Asked Peignoir, curious about this nurse that didn't act quite like a nurse should.  
  
Casalin fixed her rose-colored eyes on the sharp piercing blue of Peignoirs. "Like destroying these elementals you're worried about. I should think that that would be top priority, wouldn't it?"  
  
"Who are you?" Asked Peignoir, her sharp voice demanding.  
  
Casalin's tail flicked out from beneath the skirt of her uniform, glowing with a waning yellow light.  
  
"A Saiya-jin?" She asked, her eyes wide.  
  
Casalin smiled and nodded, then looked back at Son Gohan.  
  
"I'll best get the nurse." She said. "Gohan needs his position changed every three hours." She turned away and the two Krillin's shared a disbelieving glance behind her back.  
  
When she left the room the silence ended.  
  
Peignoir expelled a heavy breath. "How can she be a Saiya-jin?" She demanded. "Aren't we the last?"  
  
"We?" Yamcha asked perplexed.  
  
Future Piccolo shook his head. "How did we miss her back home?"  
  
Future Krillin frowned. "What if she's still alive?"  
  
The bald Krillin nudged Tien. "What's with all this 'we' stuff?"  
  
"I don't know." He replied. "Maybe she's a Saiya-jin too."  
  
Krillin shook his head. "She has no tail."  
  
"They can be cut off, you know." Reminded Tien. "She could be only partly Saiya-jin, too."  
  
"Her hair's the wrong colour!" Peignoir almost shouted.  
  
"Pen!" Yelled Future Piccolo.  
  
All noise suddenly stopped.  
  
"Remember what your grandfather told you?"  
  
Peignoir frowned. "About Yamcha?"  
  
Piccolo almost smacked his head.  
  
"What about me?"  
  
"No, about Vegeta-sei."  
  
Peignoir suddenly nodded. "Yeah. The Tsufuru-jin and Naichi-jin?" She looked at Piccolo with a disbelieving expression when he nodded. "You mean she could be...?" She ran a hand down the length of her plait, squeezing the water from it. "Wow."  
  
Future Krillin, also suddenly understanding, repeated her exclamation.  
  
Their awe was interrupted by the return of the Naichi-jin, followed by the well-known blonde nurse, bearing a bowl of steaming water and a few towels draped over one arm.  
  
Nurse Mari stopped when she saw everyone within the room, the broken cupboard, and that one very large window was missing. "What are you doing in here?" She demanded, momentarily angry. "And what have you done to the room? - You've broken it!" She suddenly shook her head. "No. Never mind. Forget I asked." She walked over to Gohan's bed. "I don't want to know." Motioning for Casalin to put the bowl down on the bedside table, the medical student smiled and shrugged then did as was asked.  
  
"Let's roll him." Nurse Mari said. She took hold of the I.V stand and moved it around to the other side of the bed while Casalin dragged around the brain monitor. They each stood on opposite sides of the bed.  
  
"Ready?" Asked Nurse Mari.  
  
Casalin nodded, adjusting his left arm and leg, pulling the arm up and bending it.  
  
"On three. One... two... three."  
  
On three, Mari lifted the right side of Gohan's body while her student pulled on his shoulder and hip, rolling him onto his side, his bent left arm preventing him from rolling onto his front, and Mari bent his right leg to prevent his lower half from rolling forward. Once he was satisfactorily in the recovery position, they began to wash him, cleaning his body with the warm water, then rubbing the flesh on his shoulder- blades, elbows, buttocks, heels and upper thighs with a lanolin-based moisturizer to prevent pressure-boils. Rubbing the last of the cream into the boy's shoulders, Casalin rolled him back over while Mari moved the drip and brain monitor around again.  
  
"That was good." The nurse commented to the student.  
  
Suddenly, there was a sound like popping corn as the door to the ward flew open and a short pig-like man ran into the room and skidded into the pile of shattered glass in the centre of the room.  
  
"Whoooaaah!" He screamed, flying through the air and crashing into the wall beneath the window.  
  
"Oolong!!!"  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
Gohan sighed and closed his eyes. Somehow, the darkness beneath his lids seemed less ominous.  
  
"Do you hear that?" He asked the Emperor floating beside him.  
  
"Hear what?" He asked, confused. "I hear nothing."  
  
Gohan opened his eyes and looked in the direction of where he thought Chao-tzu was.  
  
"You don't hear that humming?" He asked incredulously. "It's beautiful."  
  
The nothingness that they were within swum as he shook his head. "No."  
  
Gohan sighed. "Maybe I'm just imagining it. It feels like we've been in here for so long."  
  
"I know." Chao-tzu agreed. "I'm no longer afraid, but... now I feel nothing."  
  
"Yeah." Gohan replied, understanding. "It's like in here emotions don't exist. I'm finding it hard to feel anything now, and I know it should scare me, and I know I should be worried, but all I can really feel now is confusion."  
  
Chao-tzu sighed. "At least that's something." he said.  
  
Gohan once again felt that mental tugging that took him deep into his dreams and almost smiled in relief - if that slight twinge of something was what he was feeling. "I'm going again, Chao-tzu." He said. "These journey's never last long." And before he could hear the Emperor's reply, he fell into his memories, anxious to relive the moments of his life if only just to feel something.  
  
"I wish they would..." He whispered.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
He found himself in another strange place.  
  
It was warm here, and despite the fact that he could not open his eyes, it was light. His eyes drank of the stuff as if it were the sweetest honey. Light. His body felt stiff, as if he was tied down, and there was something forcing air into his lungs, expanding them painfully. There was also something shoved down his throat through his nose. There were murmurs around him. Strange voices that he knew he should recognize, babbling in a forgotten language he knew he should understand. There were other sounds, too. Beeps and buzzing assailing him from all sides; strange pulsating hums from unidentifiable sources. He knew he was lying down, gravity proving its point with the pressure against his back, and whatever was beneath him felt warm and soft against his skin. He felt fingers on his arm; a hand, pressing so gently and lightly in such a familiar way that his confusion deepened as he tried to remember whom it was that touched him that way. A voice was suddenly recalled within his mind, a voice that he knew, that he loved.  
  
/Mama/  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
There was a break in the storm.  
  
The silence was eerie, disquieting. Piccolo could sense a disturbance, and every so often felt the presence of a flickering ki darting just out of his reach. These feelings disturbed him and he was finding it even harder to meditate than before when the future versions of himself, Krillin, and some young woman named Peignoir turned up. They were gone now. They, Master Roshi, Bulma and Vegeta had gone to Capsule Corporation over an hour ago. The window was mended, well, sort of. Krillin, Yamcha and Tien had found a huge sheet of packing plastic and had melted it into the walls on all four sides of the destroyed window to create a make-shift wind and rain screen.  
  
Piccolo sighed out through his nose.  
  
A new torch had been brought in while one of the hospital orderlies went on the hunt for a spare strobe light, and it's pale blue light illuminated the sleeping figures within the room. Chi Chi was now on the bed beside Gokou, one of her arms flung over his chest and the other beneath her neck supporting her head. Gokou himself, was still dead to the world. Whatever that nurse had given him had knocked him flat. He'd been out without a sound for hours - not even a snore had escaped him since then. Yamcha had abandoned his sleeping post on the cupboard, more than likely fearing that it would collapse further beneath his weight, and had dragged in a chair from the Waiting Room. He was currently sprawled in it, dozing, but Piccolo could tell he wasn't really asleep. Tienshinhan had left the room hours ago, along with Krillin - probably to check up on Chao- tzu, whom he hoped was stronger than when he found him - they had obviously decided to stay in the little Emperor's ward.  
  
Piccolo sighed again.  
  
And Gohan. In the surging light of the waning torch the boy looked frail and insubstantial. If it wasn't for the minute beeping of the monitors each time the small boy's heart palpitated, he would scarcely believe that he was there. The child looked smaller lain out on the hospital bed than he did the first time he had met him. And he was only four then, not eight like he was now. He had grown up so much, so fast, and even during those two and a half months of his being deceased, the boy had changed. In some ways he was almost like a son to him, despite the fact that there was little more than four years between them.  
  
He silently pushed himself up off his sitting position on the couch, and moved over to the bed containing the subject of his thoughts. With an unidentified tightening in his chest that he had never felt before, he gazed down at the face of the boy that had changed his life irreversibly.  
  
"Gohan." He whispered on an exhaled sigh.  
  
It was wrong to see the kid like this, smothered by wires, tubes and plastic so that barely a glimpse of him could be seen beneath. It felt unrealistic somehow, and unmistakably wrong.  
  
"Gohan." He repeated, lifting one hand and running its fingers through the boy's silky black hair. "What happened, huh? Did you get yourself into even more trouble?" He shook his head slowly. "You're so much like your father in that respect, he never knows when to call it quits, either." He paused, listening to the beeping and the buzzing of the monitors beside the bed. He started to speak again, then choked. After swallowing he started again. "I wish I knew what it is that's wrong with you, kid. Then perhaps I would be able to find a way to help. But... like this - there's no knowing, and what if what we believe could help you only makes it worse? I know it must be dark in there, Gohan, and I know you must be afraid..." He leaned over and brushed a stray strand of hair away from the boy's face. "Damnitt, Gohan. For the strongest of us all you make an amazing habit of getting hurt." He paused again as he felt a tingling sensation on his cheek. He reached up and when he brought his hand back down he was amazed to find his fingers damp. Then there was nothing he could do to stop the single crystal droplet from cascading down the contours of his face and falling onto the bed, darkening a spot of the pale blue blanket. Piccolo scowled through the fogginess of his emotional pain.  
  
"Waste of water." He growled, staring at the small splotch of darker blue material.  
  
Then it happened.  
  
Piccolo was so used to hearing the monotonous even beeping of one of the stupid monitors, that when the stray beep sounded out of pace it was like an explosion going off in his head. His eyes widened and he shot his head around to stare at the machine beside him. Sure enough, the pattern was disturbed. Although it had once again settled back down into its solemn rhythm, there was one spike on the print out that was definitely out of place. Piccolo quickly dropped the sheet and bent over the bed.  
  
"Gohan?" He asked, looking down into the boy's shadowed face. "Gohan, can you hear me?" The boy was silent.  
  
He waited and a few moments later was rewarded by a stray beep.  
  
Piccolo felt joy surge through him.  
  
"Gohan!" He called louder. "It's me, Piccolo. Do you know who I am?"  
  
The machine beside him beeped erratically again. "Damnitt, Gohan!" He yelled quietly, gently touching his face. "Damnitt! Now don't you dare go away!"  
  
Another frustrated tear leaked out from beneath one eye, and as Piccolo leaned over him, the one tear fell free from the Namek's skin and landed gently on the centre of Gohan's forehead.  
  
The boy's eyelashes fluttered.  
  
Piccolo frowned and looked down intently into his face as small muscles in the boy's eyelids began to twitch.  
  
"Gohan?" He asked again.  
  
The mask covering the seven year olds nose and mouth suddenly clouded in a huge burst of white as the boy exhaled sharply. From beneath the plastic emerged a strangled groan.  
  
"Gohan!" Piccolo cried.  
  
The boy's eyelashes fluttered again as his eyebrows lifted slightly from their frown. Slowly, the skin of his eyelids tightened, and as he sighed from out beneath the mask a hollow, frightened whisper, his eyes opened.  
  
/Mr. Piccolo?/  
  
The Demon King found himself looking down into those familiar deep chocolate brown eyes that always looked up at him with such adoration in their depths, and he smiled as a great wave of relief washed over him.  
  
"Yes," He replied softly. "It's me, Gohan."  
  
The boy opened his mouth to speak but Piccolo cut him off. "No. Don't speak. I'll call Casalin." Piccolo suddenly moved out of his field of vision. Gohan's eyebrows creased at the unfamiliar name. He tried to follow the movements of Piccolo, but his head was held stiff and he felt too weak to even lift an arm. Fear suddenly surged up within him. He was about to call out when Piccolo appeared above him again. His teacher was smiling at him, his face bearing an expression he'd never seen on it before.  
  
"It's good to have you back, kid."  
  
Gohan struggled against the machine forcing him to breathe, but to no avail - he was just too weak. It took all his strength just to lift his eyelids.  
  
Piccolo could sense this, and ran his fingers through the boy's hair again to calm him. "I know, kid. The nurse is coming to get you out of these contraptions."  
  
Gohan frowned beneath the mask. /Chao-tzu./ He whispered into Piccolo's mind.  
  
"What, kid?"  
  
/Chao-tzu./ He repeated. /He's still... in there./  
  
The Demon King leaned back, confused. Then Casalin finally arrived, responding to the buzz from the button beside Gohan's bed.  
  
"What's going on?" She asked breathlessly, sliding into the room.  
  
It only took her a moment to glance over the monitors and assess the situation.  
  
"I'll be back in a minute." She said hurriedly, leaving the room, returning a moment later with Nurse Mari and a doctor in tow.  
  
The doctor checked the instrument readouts, then gave Gohan a quick check-up. He cleared his throat to the Nurse, her student, and Piccolo.  
  
"We can take him off the ventilators, but the drips and gastric tube need to stay in."  
  
Casalin and Mari nodded, then moved to opposite sides of the bed. Gohan stared up at them, his dark eyes wide, unsure of exactly what they were going to do.  
  
Casalin reached up and unclipped the mask from the sides of Gohan's face while nurse Mari lifted it off his mouth and nose, wrapping the huge clear plastic tube that was feeding the oxygen to him from the ventilator machine around her arm to hang on the hooks on the side of the machine, turning it off.  
  
Gohan gasped, suddenly breathing on his own, then screamed at the pain he was unable to express as his lungs filled with air at his own free will.  
  
The room abruptly awoke. Chi Chi flew up instantly off Gokou's cot and flung herself down beside her son's bed.  
  
"Gohan!." She cried, "Gohan, honey - you're awake! Don't ever scare me like that again!" She scolded in mock fury, then she leaned forward and hugged him.  
  
Gohan grit his teeth at the pain this caused, but relished the comfort of being in her arms. "I'm all right, mum." He husked, "Just a little bit sore."  
  
Chi Chi pulled back, allowing the others in the room to see that he was awake. She chuckled sadly and brushed a strand of his dark hair back away from his eyes.  
  
The doctor cleared his throat again. "He appears to be recovering rather quickly, most likely due to his Saiya-jin DNA, but he will have to remain here for a few more days for further monitoring before we can allow him to be released. He is still too dehydrated and anaemic to take off the I.V's."  
  
Chi Chi ignored the doctor, entirely too engrossed in her son's consciousness to even notice that he was talking. She was running her fingers through his hair, her other hand holding his smaller fingers and running her thumb over his knuckles while smiling down at him with tears glistening on her cheeks. Yamcha nodded to the doctor, indicating that he understood, while Piccolo moved over to Gokou's bedside and attempted to wake him.  
  
He had to shout three times before the drug-induced stupification that the Saiya-jin was wallowing within lifted enough to allow him to even stir in his sleep.  
  
"Gokou!" He shouted. "Gokou, wake up!"  
  
The dark-haired, pale-skinned Saiya-jin rolled over, opened his eyes, and stared blearily up at Piccolo.  
  
"Wha?" He mumbled, his eyes unfocused and his vision blurred.  
  
"Gohan's awake."  
  
Piccolo's words sounded muffled and thick through his ears and it took a while for his drugged mind to tick-over the two word sentence and comprehend it's meaning.  
  
"What?" He asked, sitting up and throwing off his artificially induced stupor like a dirty shirt.  
  
"I said," Repeated Piccolo, moving back a little. "Your son is awake."  
  
Gokou blinked. "Gohan?" He turned his head and looked over to where the doctor was leaning over the bed his son was in, obscuring his view of him. His wife was sobbing quietly. "Is he...?" He trailed off, fear clutching at him.  
  
"He's all right." Piccolo replied. "He's just a little confused."  
  
He smiled. "That's my boy."  
  
The doctor shifted and moved away, and Gokou could finally see an unobstructed view of his now awake son. A fist of sobriety slammed into his gut.  
  
He looked pale. Really pale, and from his bed Gokou could make out a faint sheen of perspiration on his forehead. He pushed himself up off the bed and stumbled across the floor over to Chi Chi's side. "Gohan!" He said.  
  
His son shifted his eyes from where he was looking at Yamcha and turned them to his tired father's pale face.  
  
"Dad?" He whispered.  
  
Gokou smiled. "Yeah, it's me, son."  
  
The corner of Gohan's lips twinged slightly as he attempted to smile. "Dad!" He repeated. "Wha-what happened?"  
  
His father frowned. "We don't know yet, son." He replied, then ruffled his son's hair.  
  
"Yeah, we do." Interrupted Yamcha.  
  
Gokou turned to face the scarred-faced warrior. "Nani?"  
  
"I said," Restated Yamcha, "That we know what happened. Well, kinda." He added, shrugging.  
  
"We had visitors while you were unconscious, Gokou." His wife said from beside him.  
  
"Who?"  
  
"Ahhh," Started Yamcha. "Well... Krillin and Piccolo."  
  
Gokou looked confused. "But they were here before, and I can see that Piccolo is here."  
  
"No." Yamcha shook his head. "The future versions of them. And a woman named Peignoir."  
  
"But I thought they were dead."  
  
"No, Gokou." Replied Piccolo. "They're not from Trunks' future, but from ours."  
  
"But I thought Trunks was from our future."  
  
"Our future as it was." The Demon King corrected. "My future self and his companions are from our future as it is."  
  
Gokou took a moment to absorb it, then nodded his understanding. "So tell me what happened."  
  
Quickly, Yamcha and Piccolo relayed to Gokou what parts of what they were told that they understood, with Chi Chi adding small details that they had forgotten.  
  
Gokou stared at them for a moment after they had finished, then his eyes fell once again on his son. "The strongest?" He asked, awed.  
  
Piccolo nodded, smiling a little. "Apparently."  
  
Gohan looked up at his father, then at Piccolo, and then finally at Yamcha. "What? What are you saying?"  
  
Gokou brushed a hand through his hair again. "Never mind, son. It doesn't matter."  
  
Gohan looked up at him for a moment longer, then his eyes widened and he started struggling to sit up.  
  
"No, Gohan, honey! Lie down!" Cried Chi Chi, attempting to push him flat.  
  
"What's wrong?" Demanded Gokou. "Gohan?"  
  
"Chao-tzu!" The child cried. "Chao-tzu! We have to find him! He's still in there!"  
  
"In where?" Asked Piccolo.  
  
"In there!" He repeated. "He's all alone, and we've got to get him out!"  
  
Gokou and Piccolo shared a confused glance across the bed.  
  
"Gohan," Said Piccolo calmly. "Gohan - listen to me. Chao-tzu's here. He's in the room next to this one!"  
  
Gohan stopped struggling almost instantly. "Is - is he all right?"  
  
Piccolo looked down. "No, not really, kid. When I found him he was almost dead."  
  
"Well, then get some senzu beans!" The kid shouted suddenly with amazing renewed force.  
  
"We can't." spoke Gokou calmly. "Korin says there won't be some ready for months."  
  
Gohan sighed and ceased his struggling against their hands. Then, abruptly, he lapsed into unconsciousness.  
  
"Gohan!" Cried Gokou.  
  
The doctor suddenly moved past him from out of nowhere, quickly checked Gohan's pulse and breathing, then stood back. "He's all right." He told them. "Just sleeping."  
  
Gokou, Chi Chi, Piccolo and Yamcha released heavy breaths.  
  
"As I said before," Continued the doctor. "He will need to remain here for the next few days - a week at the most - for further monitoring." He inclined his head towards them. "Until then good - uhhhh, well morning, I suppose." With a final nod the doctor and nurse Mari left, but Casalin remained behind.  
  
"Well," She said in the sudden awkward silence. "Ahh, now that I've found you, what are we going to do about it?"  
  
Gokou placed a hand behind his head in a familiar comic gesture and scratched at an imaginary itch somewhere at the base of his neck. "Well, actually, I'm not too sure on that one. This is the first time I've met a Saiya-jin that hasn't tried to kill me straight away."  
  
Chi Chi sighed and sent her husband an exasperated look. "Well, for starters, you can come and visit us whenever you get the chance."  
  
Casalin smiled at her. "I'd love to."  
  
Chi Chi returned the smile. "Well, that's one thing."  
  
"In fact," Started Casalin, glancing at the watch on her left wrist. "I'm off duty in about another ten minutes. It's almost three in the morning."  
  
"Good." Said Gokou, standing up but still holding the unconscious Gohan's smaller hand within his own. "Then we can all go over to Capsule Corp. and begin training for the coming battle." He looked over at Yamcha. "I take it that's where they all went?"  
  
As Yamcha nodded, Chi Chi stood up furiously. "Oh, no you don't, Gokou-san!" She yelled at him. "There's no way I'm going to let you go galloping off in your condition to get battered even more than you all ready are by those hard-headed friends of yours. And there's absolutely no way that I'm going to let you corrupt this young woman," She pointed at a wide-eyed Casalin. "Into going with you! So you better just sit down on that bed right this instant Mr. Throw A Mountain At Me And I'll See How Far I Can Fling The Bits!" She pointed savagely at the empty hospital cot beside Gohan's. "You're staying right here by your injured son's side and that's final!" With that Chi Chi sat back down and once again turned her attentions towards Gohan.  
  
"But Chi Chi!" Gokou implored, sounding much like a petulant child.  
  
Chi Chi kept her back to him. "No 'But's, Mister! I all ready told you what you're going to do. Now - DO IT!"  
  
Gokou dejectedly sat back down on the bed. "Yes, dear." He mumbled to her back.  
  
"That's better." She said to him, using the tone she usually reserved for Gohan when he was being good.  
  
Casalin shot an amazed look at Yamcha, who shrugged, a pained expression on his face, and smiled slightly - but somehow the smile ended up looking more like a grimace.  
  
Piccolo, on the other side of Gohan's bed and closer to the makeshift window, was struggling to suppress a grin as Gokou sat on the edge of the hospital cot, head down, pushing his fingers against each other in helplessness.  
  
Chi Chi's head shot up and she fixed Piccolo with a hard stare. For some reason he no longer found it hard to suppress his smile - now, it was impossible. "Uhhh," He growled suddenly. "Excuse me for a moment." He brushed past them on his way to the door, and once through he closed it behind him. Abruptly, the faint sound of laughter reached their ears, and Chi Chi spun her head around to face the door, giving it a filthy look. Then she turned back around with a loud 'Humph', and pointedly ignored Piccolo as the door opened and he re-entered the room, a satisfied smirk on his lips.  
  
"Fun?" Asked Yamcha, grinning.  
  
"I don't know what you're talking about." Replied Piccolo, sitting down on the couch.  
  
Casalin glanced at her watch one more time, then sighed. "Time's up, guys. I'm beat and I'm outta here. I'm gonna go home, have a shower, then sleep." She shrugged and turned away from them towards the door. "Nurse Mari'll be on for another hour or so. She's been called for an extra shift seeming they're short on nurses tonight. If not her, it'll be someone else that will be in to check on you every hour or so." She went over and poked a startled Gokou in the chest with her forefinger. "And if I hear anything about you caught trying to sneak out of the hospital again like you did in West Kong, I'm gonna come after you with the largest needle you've ever seen!"  
  
Gokou shrunk back from her finger, his eyes wide. "H-hai, kangofu- san."  
  
Casalin smiled at him, then pinched his cheek as if he were a little boy. "Good."  
  
Chi Chi stared up at her. "How did you know?"  
  
Casalin smiled and put a finger to the side of her nose, then whispered. "I was briefed on that, too."  
  
Chi Chi chuckled as Casalin smiled again and headed for the door. And there she paused with her hand on the door handle, her head half turned towards them. "Capsule Corporation, you say?" She asked.  
  
Yamcha and Gokou nodded.  
  
"Perhaps I'll go there later." She told them. "Is it a good place to train?"  
  
Gokou nodded again. "If you're lucky, Vegeta might let you use the gravity chamber. He's a little stingy about sharing it, though." He mused over it for a moment. "I don't know how you'll handle it, either, there's never been a female warrior in our midst before."  
  
Casalin grinned at him. "By any estimation," She told him. "I'd say you now have three."  
  
Gokou blinked at her while Piccolo and Yamcha watched her silently, waiting for her to explain.  
  
"Three?" He asked.  
  
"Mmhm." Replied Casalin nodding. She indicated herself. "Me, Peignoir, and..." She flicked her hand over in Chi Chi's direction.  
  
"Chi Chi?" Asked Gokou, casting a disbelieving glance at his wife.  
  
Casalin frowned at him. "You mean you didn't know? She did fight you, you know." She moved back over to them and looked long and hard at the Princess. "Well, it may be rather undeveloped, but it's definitely there." She shook her head at Gokou. "You Saiya-jin men sure are unobservant." With that last statement she turned and left.  
  
"But... Chi Chi?" He started.  
  
His wife stood up, her dark eyes flashing with anger. "What are you implying, Gokou-san?"  
  
As Casalin walked down the corridor she heard Gokou saying; "N- nothing, dear. I wasn't implying anything!"  
  
She chuckled as she strolled down the corridor, the emergency generators humming loudly in the sleepy silence, then headed for home.  
  
  
  
************  
  
  
  
In the ward next to the one occupied by Son Gokou, Son Gohan, Son Chi Chi, Piccolo and Yamcha, the lights were fortunately still working.  
  
Tienshinhan sat solemnly beside the only bed occupied in the room, holding the tiny white hand of the Tibetan Emperor in his much larger and stronger grip. Unconsciously he was rubbing Chao-tzu's index finger with his thumb. His attention was drawn elsewhere, deep into himself, where he struggled to find the consciousness of his closest friend.  
  
Krillin was asleep, sprawled out on one of the other beds, snoring gently, the fingers of his left hand twitching impulsively in his dreamy stupor.  
  
Tien's three eyes were closed, his mind far from his body, searching, delving deep into the recesses of the world's consciousness. He hadn't told anyone yet, of this strange phenomenon of the world's collective consciousness - they weren't ready for it yet. They weren't ready to learn that some thing, in some way, on an unconscious level, was influencing them all.  
  
He didn't want to be here, mixed in fully amongst the small parts of the unconsciousness of everyone else in the world. Here he felt insignificant, inferior and open to anything. Years of being stronger than nearly most everyone else meant nothing here. It was as if layers of himself were being stripped away so that all that was exposed was what he started with. He felt like an infant.  
  
But he had no other choice. He had searched the whole world for the mind of his best friend when searching inside the tiny Emperor's body became futile. The only other place to look, the only other place left, was here. Here where minds were unaware of each other, but strangely linked together. It was along these invisible links that Tien's consciousness travelled, touching gently upon the minds he passed through, moving on when again and again they were not the one he was looking for. It seemed as if he had been searching for years, when in truth barely a minute had passed. Growing frustrated, he called out Chao-tzu's name.  
  
His voice echoed loudly in the darkness that the unconsciousness floated within, and the chains suddenly convulsed and wavered madly, swimming as if water. Tien suddenly became afraid. He didn't want to damage anything in this place, Kami knew what would happen.  
  
He was about to start looking again when a ripple shuddered through the darkness, carrying with it a voice that passed beyond his ears and faded.  
  
"Tien?"  
  
"Chao-tzu?" He called. "Was that you?"  
  
"Tien!" Came back the voice.  
  
"Chao-tzu, where are you?"  
  
"Over here, Tien!" The ripples passed by whispering.  
  
"Where?" In the blackness he couldn't see anything.  
  
"Here!" The little mime called back.  
  
Suddenly, within the darkness, a tiny pinprick of space began to glow.  
  
"I see you!" He called out, then his consciousness shot forwards, speeding through the dark like a glass mote towards that one minutely glowing spec of light in the black infinitude. Then abruptly he was within the golden light, it's milky haze surrounding him on all sides. "Chao-tzu?" He called hesitantly.  
  
"I'm here, Tien." Came his voice, not from one particular place but from all directions. "How do we get out of here?"  
  
"I have an idea." He replied. He compulsively held out his arm. "Grab hold of my hand."  
  
He felt a warmth against his hand, what he presumed to be Chao-tzu's smaller palm and fingers. Then something exploded in his mind.  
  
His eyes shot open and he was once again in the hospital ward. He saw Krillin sitting up, staring at him, then a jolt passed through his arm, starting at the shoulder and tingling down through his fingers and into Chao-tzu's hand.  
  
Tien's three eyes were wide as he stared down at the small child-like Emperor. He heard Krillin calling to him, but all his concentration was on the face of his best friend. Suddenly, a small moan issued out from between his white lips.  
  
Krillin started while Tien leaned further over to Chao-tzu.  
  
The moan was repeated. "Tien?" The mime whispered.  
  
Tien's face broke into a smile while Krillin ran for the wall, pressing the large red button that sounded at the matron's desk.  
  
"I'm here, Chao-tzu." He said.  
  
The mime's eyelids tightened, then opened. "I feel broken." He whispered to him.  
  
"I'd say you are." Said Krillin from the other side of the bed.  
  
Chao-tzu inhaled, then cringed. "It hurts to breathe. And what have they stuck up my nose?"  
  
Tien laughed. "That's a tube to help you breathe, little guy." He sighed. "You were badly beaten, Chao-tzu. We weren't sure you would make it."  
  
Krillin moved in closer to the bedside. "Do you remember who did this to you?"  
  
Chao-tzu closed his eyes and shook his head slightly. "Sorry. I don't remember anything. Anything except you, Tien. How long were you planning on leaving me in there?"  
  
Tien smiled down at the mime. He was about to say something when the door opened and two nurses rushed in, a doctor on their heels, and all conversations were suddenly ended.  
  
  
  
  
  
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A/N: **Sits on a moocow bean-couch** Ohayo! **Points at three males sitting on the floor playing with HP Lego(** See them? They're my muses. If they do something amusing then you'll have a new chapter to read. ^-^ **Points at a small, purple and black gremlin-like creature** See that? That's my moofie. If someone doesn't entertain my muses soon my moofie will crash my C.P and then I'll never get the next chapter finished! **Pouts at her muses** I hate when they become distracted. Anyway…  
  
^^Fic Info!^^  
  
There is a point to the singing bit, but you're just gonna have to wait for it! ^-^ And there's no Yaoi! Not even hints! – not until the final chapters, anyway. Well, there's not SUPPOSED to be. 'Specially not between Tenshin and that mime! That… muh-muh-*shudders*-Mime! Arrrgh! But if you do pick up on anything that you suspect to be a hint… tell me! I wanna know if I'm being subtle enough in laying the grounds for a relationship that's not in existence, but bloody well should be.  
  
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